PRESS STATEMENT ISSUED BY THE DEPARTMENT OF HOUSING:

28 NOVEMBER 2007

N2 GATEWAY: 1000 HOME HANDOVER IN DELFT

A thousand families who used to live in shacks in Joe Slovo will spend

Christmas in brand new two-bedroom homes in Delft. And more than another

thousand families will join them shortly after New Year.

The first batch of completed 1000 Delft Symphony homes will be handed over

to their new owners by Minister of Housing Lindiwe Sisulu on Sunday.

As the families move into their new homes, new arrivals from informal

settlements fill the spaces in Temporary Relocation Areas (TRAs) to wait

their turn.

³We are gathering momentum,² said Director-General of the National

Department of Housing, Itumeleng Kotsoane.

³The N2 Gateway development cycle involves people moving from shacks to

temporary relocation areas, to permanent homes. The faster we move people

through the temporary relocation areas, the faster we eradicate informal

settlements.²

Because some of the remaining residents of the informal settlement at Joe

Slovo have proved unwilling to relocate, the new generation of TRA residents

include families from other informal settlements, including New Rest.

Contractors need access to land presently occupied by shack dwellers in

order to build homes. Occupants of Temporary Relocation Areas will be

offered access to new homes as soon as they are built, on any of the N2

Gateway building sites between District Six and Delft.

Prince Xhanti Sigcawu, general manager of the N2 Gateway Pilot Project for

state-owned developer, Thubelisha, said a total of 4224 Breaking New Ground

(BNG) homes were under construction in Delft Symphony. These homes are given

free to families qualifying for the full housing subsidy.

An additional 2 000 rental and affordable bonded units - for people who do

not qualify for the full subsidy - are slated for the area known as Delft

3-5. Money generated by selling portions of land to private sector

development partners is used to cross-subsidise the building of bigger and

better quality free (BNG) homes. In this way, instead of having to build

homes with just the R38 000 subsidy, assets worth R55 000 could now be given

away free.

Sigcawu said work on another 4 000+ BNG homes got underway in Delft 7-9 last

month.

Together, these different typology of houses (ie. Rental, affordable and

fully subsidised), would create integrated communities.

New homes are also sprouting in New Rest, between Gugulethu and the N2

Freeway, where male volunteers from the community have been building after

being challenged to contribute by Minister of Housing Lindiwe Sisulu during

Women¹s Month. Women¹s Build 2007 contributed 26 homes in 16 days; the men

are working to complete 67 homes in a month, for handover to beneficiaries

on Monday.

Because proper homes take up more space than shacks the families who will

not benefit from new homes in New Rest are moving to temporary accommodation

in Delft to wait their turn.

*The 1000 Home Handover ceremony takes place in Delft Symphony on Sunday

from 11am. For more information please call Ndivhuwo Mabaya (083 645 7838)

of the Department of Housing or Prince Sigcawu on 082 883 9739).