Residents of Lourierpark, the Bloemdal small holdings area, as well as Pellissier and surrounds, are breathing a sigh of relief after the Red Ants were deployed earlier today to remove the land invaders on the farm Brandkop 702.
This comes after people from all over the greater Mangaung area were promised land and started erecting shacks next to the Jagersfontein Road early on Saturday, 2 March.
The very same day, the Mangaung Metro obtained a court order to stop the illegal invasion, but refused to implement the order. This led to land grabbers pouring into the area to erect houses here.
The DA, as well as civil organisations like the Fichardtpark Neighbourhood Association (FNA), applied to the Free State High Court to enforce the court order.
Following this, the metro involved the Red Ants to start evicting the unlawful occupiers in the early hours of Friday morning. By midday the workers in red had removed most of the unlawful structures.
Left at the site were heaps of corrugated iron and belongings of people who had moved to the area.
Qondile Khedama, spokesperson for the Mangaung Metro, says that every time there is a land invation in the metro, the city’s constraint resources have to be directed to solve the problem, while it could have been used towards service delivery programmes.
“As the city, we call upon those who are involved in land invasion projects to join hands with the municipality and stop illegal activities. We are mindful of the backlog of site allocations, but there is a process that is in place being fast-tracked to settle all those who are on the site allocation list.”
This having been said, residents who are waiting for land gathered in groups at the entrance to Pellissier in Pellissier Drive at the T-junction with the Jagersfontein road, saying they were waiting to put their names on a list.
“We have put our names on lists, but we are not sure if it is an official list,” one of them said from a parked vehicle in the shade of a tree.
They said they battled to get the right information and some of them have been waiting since 2019 for the allocation for land in the metro.
