EDITORIAL: Herman Mashaba must help all evictees
Foreigners who are documented are free to live on his doorstep and at his expense
The trouble with Johannesburg mayor Herman Mashaba is that he often doesn’t know what he is talking about. But like other politicians in the Trumpian mould, that doesn’t stop him talking. Mashaba’s comments over the past week about housing and foreigners are wrong because they do not have a basis in fact; and they are in conflict with the Constitution. They are, however, very worth discussing, as the problems of housing, the inner city and migration are all difficult and increasingly intractable problems, which need better solutions. An indispensable place to start, though, is with the facts. Mashaba has made two points: the bad buildings in the inner city have many foreign inhabitants. In his mission to clean up these buildings and expropriate, sell or develop them, the tenants will be evicted. He says the city is not responsible for providing emergency housing for evicted foreigners. Second, he says, the city’s meagre resources – its housing budget – will not be used to provide ho...
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