Eight Belhar families wait for court to decide if they must be evicted from housing complex

CAPE TOWN - A court process is underway to determine whether a group of eight Belhar families, who have taken up illegal occupation at a housing complex, will be evicted.

The families, who were living in Belhar as backyarders, took up residence at vacant houses in the Pentech housing development in May 2021.

The city said that it initiated the eviction order because beneficiaries on its housing waiting list had now been displaced due to the occupation.

Bradley Jacobs, who moved his family into one of the units, said that they were given permission to move into the houses by a city official, who had been fired.

Jacobs said that bad living conditions as backyard dwellers also prompted him to move his family into the housing development.

"Where we stayed, it was wet and it was unbearable for us to stay at those places. We used to sit in the same Wendy house where you stay, the same room where you eat is the same room where you're going to put a bucket you use as a toilet."

City Mayco member for Human Settlements, Carl Pophaim, said that the illegal occupation had left other families without homes.  

"We are standing up for families who have been disposed by the unlawful occupiers. They are the real victims of this hijacking of completed homes the night before these were to be handed over. The hijacking was led by people who were already living in the area."

Pophaim said that the city has provided alternate accommodation for the families in Elsies River, which they have refused, while judgment on the eviction application has been reserved.