Leaking sewage, broken windows, and mounds of garbage define life inside hijacked buildings like Casa Mia in Hillbrow.
Justice Minister and Inter-Ministerial Committee (IMC) chairperson Mmamoloko Kubayi says about 2,400 non-compliant buildings have been registered across South Africa’s eight metropolitan municipalities, as the government moves to tackle hijacked and abandoned buildings.
Kubayi was briefing the media on Tuesday on progress made by the committee in implementing the government’s five-point plan on migration management when she outlined the committee’s operational plan to deal with hijacked and abandoned buildings.
She said the buildings were, in many cases, illegally occupied and used for criminal activities including human trafficking, drug dealing, illicit goods trading and general substance abuse.
The IMC considered a consolidated report on managing bad and hijacked buildings across the country’s eight metropolitan municipalities.
