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eviction rights Archives | Eviction Lawyers South Africa

Oct 28
0

Opera singer wins court battle with old-age home

By | Eviction news

Reprinted from iol.co.za, by Mervyn Naidoo – 2024-10-27

The High Court application brought by the heads of a Durban retirement village to evict a long-time resident from their facility was dismissed with costs last week.

The Amanzimtoti Welfare Organisation For the Aged moved to terminate Diana Patricia Gregson’s lifetime right and occupation of a unit and use of a garage at the Poinsettia Park Retirement Centre.

AWOFTA alleged that Gregson, a professional opera singer, who also had UK citizenship, had not occupied her unit since December 2019, which exceeded their permitted absence period.

They stated that various clauses in the agreement and house rules supported their termination bid.

AWOFTA contends that her prolonged absence constituted a breach of the life rights.

Their legal representatives served a letter threatening to terminate her life right in January 2022.

Gregson’s attorney Shaheen Seedat, who is on Legal Aid South Africa’s ‘s panel as a judicare practitioner, eventually filed her notice to contest the AWOFA’s application in April 2023.

The 81-year-old Gregson was granted condonation for the late filing (11 days) of her response.

Gregson said she suffered severe gallbladder attacks since December 2022 which led to her hospitalisation in the UK April 2023 and was only able to consult Seedat in May.

She said the AWOFTA’s application contained numerous false claims and deviations from the truth.

Gregson said she was the registered owner of the unit at retirement village .

During the AWOFTA’s AGM held July 1985, her late mother Gladys Gregson, who attended, posed a question about Gregson’s and her intended long term absences from Poinsettia Park.

Gregson said, according to the minutes of the said meeting, all cottages were sold without Sectional Title and no cottages were for renting and there were no restrictions on leave of absence for residents of cottages bought.

“It was for that reason that my late mother purchased the said property.

“Both my mother, my late sister and I had dual citizenship in South Africa and the UK.

“I was an opera singer and performed in various countries throughout the world previously, and never had any issues with long absences from Poinsettia Park,” read an extract from Gregson’s affidavit.

Accordingly, Gregson’s mother signed a 99-year lease for the right to the exclusive use and occupation of the unit, which was concluded in 1986.

She was substituted as the owner of the unit and covered the carport during 1995 and the occupier of the property since 1996.

Gregson has had previous legal run-ins with the body corporate regarding her rights and occupation of the unit, which necessitated her approaching the same court in 2018, where a consent order was granted in her favour.

The body corporate undertook not to harass Gregson and allow her peaceful and undisturbed occupation of the unit.

Gregson also challenged the body corporate over levy charges due by her, which was handled by the Durban Magistrates Court.

In the 2018 ruling, the court also ordered that in respect of the levies issue, the body corporate give a full breakdown of her levy account, look into excessive charges, and submit their formula for levy calculation, all of which must be dealt with in the Magistrate’s Court.

Having travelled to the UK in December 2019, Gregson informed the body corporate about her departure and had no idea that Covid-19 would emerge.

Lockdown restrictions in the UK made travelling back impossible.

Her return home was further complicated by her inability to take the Covid 19 vaccine because of significant allergies to various pharmaceuticals.

The restrictions regarding non vaccine passport travel were only relaxed in late 2022, but Gregson was already beset by other health problems by then.

She was also threatened with eviction in 2021, but the body corporate were not able to follow through without a court order.

Gregson maintained that she had legal possession of the property for over 27 years and her mother’s lifelong lease with the body corporate was still valid, in her name, and must be honoured.

She said she cannot be forced to accept the body corporates new rules to her detriment, which were not contained in her original contract.

In last week’s sitting the court said the crux of this matter lay with the interpretation of the memorandum of agreement concluded by AWOFTA and Gregson’s mother, and the minutes of July 1985 AGM, and the house rules of the retirement centre.

The court found that there were no agreement that directly refers to AWOFTA and Gregson.

However, her mother entered into an agreement with AWOFTA and Gregson succeeded her, and noted that the organisation agreed to being bound by the original agreement, including its flaws.

It was pointed out that the “life rights” agreement did not directly address absences due to certain health conditions.

AWOFTA has not established a clear right to the relief sought, the court ruled.

For further information

Simon Dippenaar & Associates, Inc. is a law firm of specialist eviction lawyers in Cape Town, Johannesburg and Durban. We help landlords and tenants maintain healthy working relationships. Contact one of our eviction attorneys on 086 099 5146 or simon@sdlaw.co.za if you need help with tenants’ rights or landlords’ responsibilities.

Further reading:

Jul 03
0

City of Cape Town says Belhar families facing eviction won’t be homeless

By | Eviction news, Homeless

Reprinted from ewn, by Carlo Peterson – 2024-07-01

CAPE TOWN – The City of Cape Town said that nine Belhar families who illegally occupied a housing complex would not be rendered homeless if they were evicted.

The families who were living in the area as backyarders moved into the vacant houses at the Pentech housing development in May 2021.

While judgment to determine whether the families will be evicted has been reserved, the city said the occupants had been offered alternative accommodation in Elsies River, but refused to move.

City Mayco member for Human Settlements Carl Pophaim said that the occupants already had homes before moving into the complex.

“The facts show the unlawful occupants will not be rendered homeless and have the capacity to go back to their original homes.”

Bradley Jacobs, who moved his family into one of the houses, said that besides the bad living conditions they were experiencing, housing officials also made them promises.

“We went to housing meetings, where promises were made about the backyard dwellers, but when the project kicked off it was all people from other areas. I thought: ‘What happened to us?'”

Jacobs said the families did not want to go back to being backyard dwellers and refused to be moved outside of the Belhar area.

For further information

Simon Dippenaar & Associates, Inc. is a law firm of specialist eviction lawyers in Cape Town, Johannesburg and Durban. We help landlords and tenants maintain healthy working relationships. Contact one of our eviction attorneys on 086 099 5146 or simon@sdlaw.co.za if you need help with tenants’ rights or landlords’ responsibilities.

Further reading:

Mar 04
0

Echoes of District Six evictions in case before the Constitutional Court

By | Eviction news, Evictions, Homeless

Reprinted from GroundUp, by Masego Mafata – 2024-02-28

Judges question City of Cape Town about eviction of Bromwell Street tenants

  • The City of Cape Town appeared before the Constitutional Court on Tuesday in a case concerning the eviction of tenants from Bromwell Street, Woodstock.
  • Justice Mbuyiseli Madlanga asked the City whether the planned eviction resembled the forced removals from District Six during apartheid.
  • Ndifuna Ukwazi, on behalf of the Bromwell Street tenants, has argued that the City’s exclusion of emergency accommodation in its housing plans for the inner-city is unconstitutional.
  • The City said it was not obliged to provide emergency accommodation in the inner-city.
  • Judgment was reserved.

Judgment in the eviction of City of Cape Town tenants from Bromwell Street in Woodstock was reserved in the Constitutional Court on Tuesday.

During the hearing, Justice Mbuyiseli Madlanga asked the City if the eviction echoed the displacement of families from District Six under apartheid. “Is this not a refined, modern-day District Six type of displacement?” asked Justice Madlanga.

Housing advocacy group Ndifuna Ukwazi (NU), on behalf of the Bromwell Street residents facing eviction, had approached the Constitutional Court to appeal against a 2023 judgment of the Supreme Court of Appeal which overturned an order by the Western Cape High Court. The High Court had ruled in 2021 that the City’s emergency housing policy is unconstitutional and ordered the City to provide emergency housing in the inner city for the Bromwell Street families.

The Bromwell Street cottages were bought by Woodstock Hub Pty Ltd, a property development company, for R3.15-million in 2013.

The residents began their protracted legal battle against their eviction in 2016. They are long-term tenants of the cottages who work and attend schools in surrounding areas and the inner city. Among their requests has been that the City provide emergency accommodation in the inner city so that they can stay close to their places of work and schooling.

Arguing for the residents, advocate Sheldon Magardie said the City prioritised social housing over accommodation in the inner city, and this ultimately excluded people rendered homeless following an eviction. This, Magardie argued, was unreasonable, irrational and unconstitutional. Many of the Bromwell Street residents would not qualify for the City’s social housing programmes “because they don’t earn enough money to qualify”, said Magardie.

The City’s social housing programme, for which houses in Woodstock are still to be built, is “a rental or co-operative housing option for households earning between R1,850 and R22,000 a month,” according to this Western Cape Government website.

“The inevitable outcome for any person in need of emergency housing in the inner city is relocation to the Incremental Development Areas or Temporary Relocation Areas on the outskirts of the city,” Magardie told the court.

In a lengthy exchange between Justice Leona Theron and Magardie, Justice Theron questioned the lack of clarity from NU regarding which specific housing policy and which specific sections in that policy were unconstitutional.

Magardie responded by saying that the City did not have a singular housing policy but relied on various pieces of legislation and policies.

On behalf of the City, advocate Karrisha Pillay SC argued that no legislation or policy made it an obligation for the City to provide emergency accommodation in the inner city for people who have been evicted in the inner city. “The City does not have emergency accommodation in the inner city,” she said.

Pillay said the City had made offers of temporary emergency housing in Wolwerivier, Maitland and Kampies, all of which had been rejected by the Bromwell residents.

Is this a special case?

Acting Justice Matthew Chaskalson asked advocate Magardie whether the Bromwell Street case should be treated as a special case or an ordinary eviction case.

“We are dealing with lawful tenants who were only evicted because of the consequences of the City’s housing policy. We are not talking about illegal occupiers … This particular community is one of a handful of communities that managed to survive apartheid intact, in a white area … What this process is doing is aggravating spatial apartheid by pushing poor coloured people to the outskirts of the city,” said Justice Chaskalson. He said this made him wonder whether the case should be treated as a special case.

Magardie argued that this was indeed a special case. He said the historical context of Bromwell Street and the question of spatial justice made the City’s action against the Bromwell families unreasonable.

Abahlali baseMjondolo, represented by the Socio-Economic Rights Institute of South Africa, supported NU as amicus curiae, and also argued for a special case as it could develop the law to give sufficient guidance on the location of emergency accommodation.

Advocate Jason Brickhill, on behalf of Abahlali, told the court that currently the law does not give clear guidance on the location of emergency accommodation or on access to services in the accommodation.

But Pillay argued that the applicants had at no point pleaded the case as a special case. She added that if the case had been pleaded as such, the City “may have well said we’ll drop two social housing programmes for emergency housing programmes” in the inner city. But, she said, as it stands, the City does not have the funds or the land available to create emergency accommodation in the inner city because ten of the 11 land parcels that the City owns are designated for social housing.

Judgment was reserved.

For further information

Simon Dippenaar & Associates, Inc. is a law firm of specialist eviction lawyers in Cape Town, Johannesburg and Durban. We help landlords and tenants maintain healthy working relationships. Contact one of our eviction attorneys on 086 099 5146 or simon@sdlaw.co.za if you need help with tenants’ rights or landlords’ responsibilities.

Further reading: