CITY OF CAPE TOWN
24 NOVEMBER 2014
SPEECH BY THE CITY’S EXECUTIVE MAYOR, PATRICIA DE LILLE, AT THE
HANDOVER OF TITLE DEEDS TO LAGUNYA SHOP OWNERS
Members of the Mayoral Committee
Members of the Steering Committee
Councillors
Lagunya Business Association
Honoured guests
Ladies and gentlemen.
Good morning, goeie môre, molweni, as-salaam alaikum, shalom.
Days like today lie very close to my heart.
For it is on days like today that we, as the City of Cape Town, have a chance
to right some of the wrongs of the past.
One of the ways in which we do this is by ensuring that those who were
previously excluded from economic opportunities are given the means to
access those opportunities.
In so doing, we are building an inclusive city where everyone has a stake in
the future and enjoys a sense of belonging.
Our society went through a dark time when many of our residents were
excluded from opportunities and were made to feel that they could not
contribute fully to society.
In order to move forward, we need to acknowledge the injustices of our past.
As we know all too well, spatial exclusion was not the only form of
discrimination practised by the apartheid government.
Economic exclusion also prevented many people from realising their full
potential.
Twenty years later, this legacy remains with us.
It is seen in the faces of poverty across our nation, stark reminders of how far
we still have to go to right the wrongs of the past.
Without a stake in society, many have come to feel locked out and
forgotten.
But we are working to change this.
Owning property is one way in which people can feel as if they belong and
have a vested interest in society.
This brings us to the auspicious occasion we are celebrating today.
During the apartheid era, businesses were given permits to lease properties
from the old iKapa Town Council.
Some of these business owners have held leases for up to four decades,
without ever having the opportunity to become owners of the premises from
which they worked so hard to make a living.
This was fundamentally unjust, and it needed to change.
The City of Cape Town therefore took the decision to alienate 148 properties
in the Lagunya area and sell them to the tenants at the reduced rate of R20
per m2.
We also subsidised the transfer fees of R3 092 for each of the tenants.
By June 2014 we had assisted 55 claimants to become the registered owners
of their business premises.
Today we hand over 41 title deeds and 15 certificates of ownership,
indicating that transfer has finally taken place.
Today we give the claimants something that should never have been denied
them in the first place.
We made a conscious decision not to let red tape slow down the transfer
process, because every day spent waiting for what was rightfully theirs was
one day too long.
One such claimant is Mr Belford Ntlatsana. He has been running the Nomsa
Trading Store in NY6, Section 1, Gugulethu for 40 years.
Mr Ntlatsana is 79 years old and today he has finally become the owner of his
business premises. He has persevered through decades of difficulty and
today that persistence has paid off.
Another example is Mr Patrick Nongaloza from Nyanga. This gentleman, a
joiner by trade, once saw the potential of a dilapidated building on Emms
Drive. The vandalised building had no roof and no electricity, and no bank
would give him the loan he needed to fix the premises.
And so Mr Nongaloza decided to do it on his own. Through 25 years of hard
work and saving, Mr Nongaloza turned this once dilapidated building into
Maphindi’s Butchery and Takeaways, and now the premises even includes
conference facilities.
Today, this successful businessman finally becomes the owner of the empire
that he has built.
Claimants such as Mr Ntlatsana and Mr Nongaloza will now be empowered
through property ownership to take out loans and expand their businesses,
creating jobs and spurring on the economic development of the Lagunya
area.
It is a great honour for the City of Cape Town to facilitate this upliftment.
By helping these claimants, we are enabling them to help others in the
community.
This is how we are building a caring and inclusive city; a city in which
everyone has a stake, and where we are all working to make progress
possible together.
In closing I would like to honour the claimants for the decades of
perseverance that have brought them to this day.
I wish you every success and prosperity for many years still to come.
Thank you, baie dankie, enkosi.
God bless.
End
Issued by: Integrated Strategic Communication, Branding and Marketing
Department, City of Cape Town
Media enquiries: Pierrinne Leukes, Spokesperson for the Executive Mayor –
Patricia de Lille, City of Cape Town, Tel: 021 400 1302 or Cell: 084 272 7614, Email: Pierrinne.leukes@capetown.gov.za