Speech by the Executive Mayor of Cape Town, Alderman
Patricia de Lille on the occasion of the signing of
partnership agreements with the City’s Social Housing
partners
The Mayoral Committee Member for Human Settlements, Cllr Ernest
Sonnenberg
The Executive Director of Human Settlements, Seth Maqetuka
Representatives of the City’s Social Housing partners
Guests
Meeting the enormous demand for housing is a challenge for governments
throughout South Africa.
Cities have particular challenges. Not only do we have to contend with the
spatial and economic legacies of Apartheid era planning, we also have to
contend with an increasing demand for housing as a result of
urbanisation.
This means that the provision of housing opportunities is a constantly
moving target.
In Cape Town, we face additional challenges which are the result of
geography such as the shortage of suitable land for human settlements.
Given the nature of these obstacles, it is clear that government alone
cannot overcome them. We need the assistance of the private sector, civil
society and beneficiary communities themselves.
This makes the establishment of partnerships with these stakeholders
essential in helping to ensure that we provide housing opportunities for
those who qualify for them.
In the City of Cape Town, unlike many other municipalities in South
Africa, we have a well-managed housing demand database. Currently
there are 380 000 people on that database.
However, amongst those names on the housing database, are individuals
who can afford to rent affordable houses.
Therefore, in order to ensure that we provide fully subsidised housing to
those who are in desperate need of such assistance - the poor and the
vulnerable - we have a responsibility to ensure that those who can afford
access to social housing are given the chance to do so.
This in turn reduces the pressure on the City to provide fully subsidised
housing opportunities.
As such, the City is actively working with accredited social housing
companies who have the requisite capacity to facilitate the provision of
rental housing for low income groups.
The provision of rental accommodation allows those who can afford to
rent, but cannot afford to buy their own houses to have houses that suit
their needs.
Today, marks the renewal of partnership agreements with three
companies that have joined forces with us to achieve this goal namely;
the Social Housing Company, the Cape Town Community Housing
Company and Communicare.
The Social Housing Company and Communicare currently manage three
social housing projects in Steenberg, Brooklyn and Bothasig respectively.
These three companies are now joined by Madulammoho and Indiza Terra
as our social housing partners.
The addition of these two companies will boost our efforts to accelerate
the pace of delivering housing opportunities in the city.
These five companies have all been selected through a rigorous selection
and competitive process whereby potential partners were assessed in
terms of their capacity to develop and manage Social Housing rental stock
in line with the Social Housing Act, 16 of 2008.
The partnership agreements we are signing today will enable them to
receive social housing grants and subsidies as part of our plans to involve
the private sector in the delivery of affordable housing in the city.
To meet the housing needs of the residents of the city in future we cannot
just depend on subsidies; commercial banks must also contribute through
the provision of gap housing.
These agreements are a symbol of our commitment to meet the housing
needs of our people.
We are doing our best, every day, with limited resources to provide
housing opportunities where we can.
Because we know that owning or renting a house that one can call their
home restores the dignity of many families who have never had a stable
home all their lives.
To our partners, I would like to applaud you for partnering with us for this
initiative.
I would like to thank everyone who was involved in building these
partnerships and finalising the partnership agreements that we will be
signing.
Thank you