Maile warns spaza shop owners that structures on open spaces with critical infrastructure will be demolished
Gauteng Finance MEC Lebogang Maile says they’ve found many structures have been built without zoning provisions and consent, in the province.
Gauteng Finance MEC Lebogang Maile. Picture: @LebogangMaile1/X
JOHANNESBURG - Spaza shop owners who have erected structures on open spaces with critical infrastructure, such as water pipes, risk having their buildings demolished.
Gauteng Finance MEC Lebogang Maile said they’d found that many structures had been built without zoning provisions and consent in the province.
READ: Gauteng records lowest numbers of spaza shop registrations in the country
He addressed a media briefing in Johannesburg on Thursday morning on the progress of the registration of spaza shops in the province.
Comply or face demolition.
This is the warning from Maile, who said that structures built on critical infrastructure not only threatened spatial and economic development but posed a risk to the safety of communities as well.
“Municipalities have been encouraged to issue notices of correction to the owners. In some instances, where structures are erected on critical infrastructure, there will be a need for demolition in order to protect this critical infrastructure that services communities.”
But Maile said that this would be a last resort and demolition would only take place where regularisation cannot be achieved.