The members of the Public Assets Community Based Tenants and Owners Association (PACTOA) handed over properties in Vulindlela Heights in Mthatha to the management of Eastern Cape Development Corporation (ECDC), last week.
National treasurer for PACTOA, Sicelo Nkqayi, said they handed over properties that were managed by them to the ECDC so that the Mthatha economy could grow.
“We took over their management between 2017 and 2018, after we saw that there was no one taking care of them, and they were becoming places where criminals congregated. The properties were being vandalised and no-one cared about them.
“We are estimating that we will hand over 20 buildings (in total), but for now we have given them six. We will hand over more after people come back from the Easter holidays,” said Nkqayi.
He added that they urged the management of the ECDC to ensure that the economy of Mthatha keeps growing and that they create job opportunities for community members of Mthatha. He also encouraged the ECDC to ensure that they put people in charge who would use these buildings in a proper way so that they (the ECDC) could also get some income.
The regional manager for ECDC, Julius Nobanda, said the different properties were taken by members of PACTOA illegally.
“Now they are giving them back to us legally. Almost 70% of properties in this area of Vulindela Heights belong to ECDC. We would use this factory to empower people who are wanting to run their own businesses, especially small businesses having their own places where they could work.
“Also, (it helps that the properties are situated next to the market because we know that Mthatha is a market area.
“We are busy looking for people who are doing manufacturing because we want to support them,” said Nobanda.
He added that the problem was mismanagement which led them to lose these factories. This led the community members of Mthatha to take these properties into their own hands because they were not used in a proper way. Nobanda said they were not saying those community members were right but admitted that the ECDC played a role in creating this problem.
“We would renovate these properties and to ensure that those who are using them are paying rent. Another problem which leads ECDC to be in this problem is that some of the people don’t want to pay. They should know that they have to pay so that we could be able to pay rates in our municipality.”
