Many questions after fire in housing department's offices

The burning of municipal property in Musina has become a source of grave concern to the municipality.

Last month, a bakkie belonging to the municipality was torched while parked at the municipal offices. The perpetrators in the incident have not yet been found.

The past weekend, an office building was damaged in a fire. According to police spokesperson in Limpopo, Lt-Col Moatshe Ngoepe, the building which houses the housing department offices were partly burnt, before the fire was extinguished.

He said that preliminary investigations conducted at the scene have found that only documents and furniture in the office were partly burnt. “The motive and cause of this fire is still unknown, but our investigations will hopefully provide answers.”

Residents, who spoke on anonymity for fear of reprisals, say they have no doubt that the incident has to do with the housing problem that has been giving the municipality a headache. They believe the fire was deliberately caused to destroy evidence of corruption in the department.

Housing scandals have for years rocked the municipality and many complaints have been laid at the municipality. Not long ago, a group of concerned residents marched to the municipality, voicing their complaints about the allocation of houses, sale of RDP houses and the illegal allocation to the wrong beneficiaries.

The Democratic Alliance (DA) in Limpopo has, in the meanwhile, written to the Limpopo MEC for Co-operative Governance, Human Settlement and Traditional Affairs (COGHSTA), Ms Makoma Makhurupetje, asking her to immediately launch a forensic probe into circumstances that led to the fire.

According to the DA’s provincial spokesperson on COGHSTA, Mr Jacques Smalle, residents allege that the fire was started in an attempt to destroy low-cost housing lists and application forms.

He added that the residents claim that the housing lists in the office where the fire broke out, were manipulated to include beneficiaries who were not eligible for low-cost housing “and that this is the reason for the alleged arson.”

Musina municipality spokesperson, Mr Wilson Dzebu confirmed the fire, saying some documents were burnt during the incident. He could, however, not elaborate, as he said the case was being investigated by the police. “We are appealing to the community to come to our offices if they have problems and not vent their anger on property. We have an open-door policy. After all this is their property which they should be guarding,” he said.

Meanwhile, police have called on people with information about the suspects in this matter to phone the nearest police station or the crime stop number 0860 010 111, or the crime line SMS 32211.

Date:07 July 2017

By: Elmon Tshikhudo

Elmon Tshikhudo started off as a photographer. He developed an interest in writing and started submitting articles to local as well as national publications. He became part of the Limpopo Mirror family in 2005 and was a permanent part of the news team until 2019.

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