Since a national state of disaster has been declared, the Democratic Alliance (DA) in the Northern Cape calls on the provincial government to prioritise contingency measures that prevent further delays in housing delivery.
Recent rainfalls underscored the vulnerability of rural and impoverished communities that are still not benefiting from housing promises. Premier Zamani Saul promised 6 500 new homes to the province in December 2023. Now, 28 months and hundreds of millions of rands in debt later, the Northern Cape Department of Cooperative Governance, Human Settlements and Traditional Affairs (COGHSTA) managed to deliver just 480 new homes. An average pace of just 17 houses each month is far too slow to ever eradicate the provincial housing backlog, no matter how many loans the province adopts.
COGHSTA often complains about difficulties in accessing building sites in rural areas and the cost of transporting building materials, which are realities that should be factored into the tenders advertised by the department. With 26 bridges in the province destroyed and a number of routes closed by recent storms, the department will need to do more to ensure that temporary seasonal setbacks do not become permanent obstacles to dignified housing.
One of the routes closed as a result of heavy rainfall is the R380 near Madibeng in the Joe Morolong Local Municipality. Madibeng was meant to receive 82 homes within 12 to 18 months. But the contractor originally appointed by COGHSTA could not manage to meet expectations. The scope of the contract was cut by 86% to just ten homes and the deadline moved to August 2026, almost three years after the Premier’s first promises. How much longer is it going to take now?
The DA in the Northern Cape will continue to demand answers, accountability, and real delivery for residents in the province.