A crash course for those unfamiliar with the basics: Long-term, there have been two contested developments south of the Philippi Horticultural area. At stake are, in total, some 753 hectares, making way for, among other things, the building of 30,000 housing units, two shopping centres, a private school, and a private prison.

Applicant Nazeer Ahmed Sonday says the campaign is not opposed to development altogether. Some of the water coming into the aquifer – particularly on the northern side – is coming through an underground system which includes polluted arteries in Epping and Athlone. “They can’t farm properly there; they have to get another water source,” he says. “They want the right to sell their land to developers. And that’s practical, actually. If we want to give up our land, let’s give it up in that area, but save our best land.”

Apart from objecting to the loss of prime agricultural land and associated livelihoods; the loss of food and water security; and impact on the environment; activists and researchers have also argued that a managed groundwater system would reduce the risk of flooding for residents of the largely impoverished Cape Flats, as well as alleviating strain on Cape Town’s water supply system.

The city of Cape Town allowed valuable land designated for agricultural use to be excised from the PHA's boundaries.

Many residents on the Cape Flats, after all, were relocated under the Group Areas Act. Large developments are not ideal where there is such a high water table – not if it is inadequately managed.

According to hydrogeologists, investing in a better managed system would also reduce risks of, for example, pollution through both development and agriculture, or over-abstraction using individual boreholes during a water crisis that developed due to a lack of resilient water infrastructure.2

To date, media reports have been clear on the extent of outrage surrounding the developments. What has been unclear is how the developments were approved, seemingly against all odds. And, having examined that, the question of why they were approved.

A painstaking search through the minutes of the city’s meetings and related documents, dating back almost 10 years, reveals how the City of Cape Town allowed valuable land identified as a prime catchment area of the Cape Flats Aquifer, and designated for agricultural use, to be excised from the PHA’s boundaries, paving the way for development.

major building contractors that started the push for an urban development across 281 hectares of agriculturally designated land in the south-western corner of Philippi – it’s a dream that Roos, the company’s CEO, still holds dear to this day.

Fast forward to 26 November 2012, sixth floor of the Cape Town Civic Centre. The noon gun still reverberating, coffee still hot. Mayor Patricia de Lille, 13 council members and 15 officials from various city departments have  gathered to discuss the metropole’s future. Tea trays, biscuits and neat offices aside, this meeting is serious. Because it affects people who can’t afford tea trays, biscuits and neat offices.

People like Nicky Swartz and Ennie Kiewiets from the Egoli informal settlement in the PHA. Before the councillors had their meeting, Kiewiets and Swartz told reporter Heidi Swart about the realities of going hungry. Chicken gizzards and porridge made up a normal meal, even if they weren’t lucky enough to eat it every day. Their only chance to afford a pocket of potatoes, grown on the nearby farms, was if they bought it from an informal trader who occasionally passed by in his bakkie. It was much cheaper than at Pick n Pay or Checkers – almost R10, excluding the money saved by avoiding taxi fare. Even so, it was a luxury.

Swartz and Kiewiets were just two of many people in Cape Town who could be considered food insecure. This doesn’t just mean being hungry – it’s much bigger than that, according to the World Health Organisation. Those who are food secure “have physical and economic access to sufficient and nutritious food that meets their dietary needs and food preferences for an active and healthy life”. If a small portion of chicken gizzards every second day is enough for you, you’re all right. If not, you’re in trouble. And many people in Cape Town are in trouble.

A 2008 study of poor households in Khayelitsha, Philippi and Ocean View found that 80% of those studied were moderately or severely food insecure. In 2011, another research study found that food insecurity in poor Cape Town neighbourhoods was “severe and chronic”3. In 2013, a survey of 2,500 households throughout the metropole found that food insecurity stood at 58%. Hardest hit were poor neighbourhoods: 95% of high-income neighbourhoods felt they had adequate nutrition for a year, but just 25% of homes in low-income areas could say the same. Yet another study in 2014 found that Cape Town “cannot be considered food secure”4. Although its impact is not yet fully understood, drought has dramatically impacted food security throughout southern Africa in recent years, with the United Nations issuing a warning early in 2017 that millions were facing starvation following reduced crop and livestock production.

fter studying marketing and sales, Riaan Roos took off with only a bakkie and his dream: “To create a strong foundation for all South Africans.” According to the website of Multi Spectrum Property – the

Asked why the 281 hectares was excised from the PHA despite other land being available within the city (and despite hydrogeologist Parsons noting that the high water table was a “development constraint”) the city said: “Land in well-located areas in the City of Cape Town is not abundant and therefore the city needs to explore all alternatives, especially where the demand is high due to both growth and urbanisation. This land is immediately adjoining private land which has also been earmarked for housing development.”

The city did have a massive housing backlog. But it wasn’t new.

has “a formidable track record in the property development arena” and has “spearheaded some of the Western Cape’s largest integrated housing projects”. These include Burgundy Estate, Buh-Rein Estate and Belladonna Estate. If you’re looking to buy a place in any of these estates, you’re looking at about R330,000 minimum for a one-bedroom in Belladonna estate or up to R3.2-million for a four-bedroom in Burgundy Estate – arguably not real estate options for those on the housing list.

Coetzee is also no stranger to Roos and MSP. Back in September 2011, he worked as managing director at Roos’ MSP developments.

By 2015, Uvest had taken over from MSP, and was starting the process to get permission from various authorities to rezone several properties within the 281 hectares. It was to submit two rezoning applications pertaining to 15 properties, of which it owned 14.9 The first was needed because Uvest wanted to develop two erven, 5.7-hectares of which would be a commercial zone and 4.25-hectares of which would be occupied by a school. Ideally, they wanted to build a shopping centre, a school, and 781 parking bays. And the school, according to blueprints, is no ordinary educational haunt: it’s a Meridian school, managed by Curro. The fee structure doesn’t come cheap. Second prize would be covering the entire area with a mall.

There’s no mention of housing for those on the housing list.

ou’ll recall that there was a second piece of red tape to get out of the way: the rezoning of the land. Enter John Coetzee, Director of Developments at Uvest Property Group. According to the Uvest website, Coetzee

allow urban development. The rationale? It had not yet been (finally) decided what to build on the land. Only once a concrete application for building was in place, would an environmental impact assessment be required. In the meantime, it could rezone.

That was just over two years ago. Since then, Heritage Western Cape has refused the rezone, which Uvest has appealed twice, with both appeals dismissed. HWC approved the smaller rezoning application – for the parking lot and the mall – but the community disagreed.

The PHA Food and Farming Campaign has been fighting the above developments in the PHA for years, endorsed by 33 civil society organisations including the Kaapse Vlakte Landbou Vereniging, the Philippi Developing Farmers Association and the Philippi Horticulture Housing Committee.10 Nazeer Sonday, who spearheads the PHA Food and Farming Campaign, has been fighting this battle for a decade.

he letter from DEADP to the city brought with it more news that disturbed activists: The department ruled it was not necessary for the city to do an environmental impact assessment before rezoning the land  to

.All this was moot, however: the national minister wrote back, and refused Oaker’s request.

This was an early example of what Capetonians will by now well recognise in the management of the water crisis: an ongoing disconnect between local, provincial and national government, and a persistent challenge in finding consistent answers at all three levels. Despite the national minister’s decision, on 27 May 2011, Anton Bredell, then minister of the Provincial Department of Environmental and Development

Oaker was disciplined by the Financial Services Board for inflating the value of the land by some 2000%, effectively cheating six pension funds.

 And, adds Sonday, when the draft SDF was passed around for comment from civil society – standard practice – Oaker’s land was still demarcated as part of the PHA.

Bredell’s spokesperson Styan, however, said that a public participation process was followed.

Furthermore, council approval of the Oakland City Developmental Framework has since re-worded the approval to exclude subsidised housing, negating the claim that the development is socially justifiable. “It excludes the 1,200 families in the immediate vicinity of the PHA who live in informal settlements. These are the city’s citizens most in need, and are referred to extensively in both the SPLUMA requirements for development, and the PHA review document,” reads comment from approximately 20 civil society groups on the Environmental Impact Report for Oakland City. The same, they argue, goes for the private school.

In short, when farmers are battling a crippling drought, they argue, citizens’ food security is being placed in jeopardy through the excision of high-potential agricultural land from the PHA. This was justified to provide social housing that was needed urgently – except it may not provide social housing at all.

And then there’s another unintended consequence: in the long term, the property market also stands to lose if resources are unbearably strained. Cape Town has already begun to experience this, with water shortages affecting house prices.

Asked whether there will be low-cost housing for those on the housing list in Oaklands City, the city said that individual precinct plans for Oaklands City were still being prepared, and it therefore could not answer specific questions about the housing component of the development.

The city also stated that the provision of low-cost housing within the development could not be made into a legally binding requirement in the absence of any provisions for such conditions in the Municipal Planning By-law or in policy. However, although it was too late for the Oaklands City Development, the city said it was working on a proposed inclusionary housing policy and that it was “engaging with private developers about their role in affordable housing”.

And then there’s another unintended consequence: in the long term, the property market also stands to lose if resources are unbearably strained.

t the time Bredell amended the SDF, an October 2010 study by the city had just projected that there was still enough land within the urban edge to accommodate the increasing need for housing until 2021.

say it would irreparably compromise the integrity of the aquifer, with mine water reaching the neighbouring Ramsar sites of Zeekoevlei and Rondevlei within 20 years. They are further concerned that the mine will have consequences for the largest wetland in the PHA, which is home to 98 migratory bird species in winter and lush farmland in summer.

The EIA has been passed, however, and the activists’ appeal denied, with 300-hectares of prospecting rights granted. Consol’s atmospheric impact report and water licence use application make several recommendations for mitigating damage to the environment, and for now, that matter rests.

The study investigating the feasibility of a future mixed-use development on the PHA has also gone ahead, despite activists’ protests. It was won by Indego, headed up by one Karen Harrison, who was grilled by activists, civil society and members of the Standing Committee, a multi-party body appointed to oversee the management of the PHA, on 2 August 2017. The outcome is pending.

For the moment, the activists are contesting only the Uvest and Oakland City developments in court, following a lengthy process to get there.

On Friday, 15 September 2017, the campaign filed a case with the Western Cape High Court, challenging several decisions in the PHA relating to the above-mentioned developments. These include the city’s decision to excise the 281-hectares from the PHA, and the HWC decision to approve the rezoning of the two erven destined to be occupied by a mall, parking lot, and/or high-cost school. Sonday is one of the applicants in the case, due to be heard in 2018.

If the PHA Campaign wins, the land will remain as is for now. If they lose, Sonday could be personally liable for legal costs, because the campaign is run by volunteers like himself, at their own expense. Sonday will have to sell his smallholding in Philippi, and, simply put, lose everything. DM

new development, in a northern corner of the PHA, is the application for a 55-hectare open sand mine by Consol, which activists from the campaign are also concerned about and plan to challenge legally. They

A crash course for those unfamiliar with the basics: Long-term, there have been two contested developments south of the Philippi Horticultural area. At stake are, in total, some 753 hectares, making way for, among other things, the building of 30,000 housing units, two shopping centres, a private school, and a private prison.

Applicant Nazeer Ahmed Sonday says the campaign is not opposed to development altogether. Some of the water coming into the aquifer – particularly on the northern side – is coming through an underground system which includes polluted arteries in Epping and Athlone. “They can’t farm properly there; they have to get another water source,” he says. “They want the right to sell their land to developers. And that’s practical, actually. If we want to give up our land, let’s give it up in that area, but save our best land.”

Yet the Campaign says developers have been handed the keys to the PHA unethically at the expense of food security, water security and the livelihood of the farming community, most of whom are most vulnerable in terms of unemployment: unskilled women and youth.1

The value of land is a matter of perspective. Several factors influence land value, but, in simple terms, developable land can be more expensive. According to real estate experts Daily Maverick Chronicle spoke to, this is in theory due in part to the costs associated with rezoning, but also because of the potential value associated with development. However, hydrogeologist and groundwater expert Roger Parsons writes – in a study commissioned by local government – of the relationship between land price and economic feasibility on the PHA. “Current farming operations can continue with positive cash flow, but when opportunity cost becomes too high, it inhibits new investment in land for vegetable production. Strict adherence to agricultural zoning is needed to keep land prices in line with agricultural productive value.”

Apart from objecting to the loss of prime agricultural land and associated livelihoods; the loss of food and water security; and impact on the environment; activists and researchers have also argued that a managed groundwater system would reduce the risk of

The city of Cape Town allowed valuable land designated for agricultural use to be excised from the PHA's boundaries.

fter studying marketing and sales, Riaan Roos took off with only a bakkie

and his dream: “To create a strong foundation for all South Africans.” According to the website of Multi Spectrum Property – the major building contractors that started the push for an urban development across 281 hectares of agriculturally designated land in the south-western corner of Philippi – it’s a dream that Roos, the company’s CEO, still holds dear to this day.

Fast forward to 26 November 2012, sixth floor of the Cape Town Civic Centre. The noon gun still reverberating, coffee still hot. Mayor Patricia de Lille, 13 council members and 15 officials from various city departments have  gathered to discuss the metropole’s future. Tea trays, biscuits and neat offices aside, this meeting is serious. Because it affects people who can’t afford tea trays, biscuits and neat offices.

People like Nicky Swartz and Ennie Kiewiets from the Egoli informal settlement in the PHA. Before the councillors had their meeting, Kiewiets and Swartz told reporter Heidi Swart about the realities of going hungry. Chicken gizzards and porridge made up a normal meal, even if they weren’t lucky enough to eat it every day. Their only chance to afford a pocket of potatoes, grown on the nearby farms, was if they bought it from an informal trader who occasionally passed by in his bakkie. It was much cheaper than at Pick n Pay or Checkers – almost R10, excluding the money saved by avoiding taxi fare. Even so, it was a luxury.

Swartz and Kiewiets were just two of many people in Cape Town who could be considered food insecure. This doesn’t just mean being hungry – it’s much bigger than that, according to the World Health Organisation. Those who are food secure “have physical and economic access to sufficient and nutritious food that meets their dietary needs and food preferences for an active and healthy life”. If a small portion of chicken gizzards every second day is enough for you, you’re all right. If not, you’re in trouble. And many people in Cape Town are in trouble.

A 2008 study of poor households in Khayelitsha, Philippi and Ocean View found that 80% of those studied were moderately or severely food insecure. In 2011, another research study found that food insecurity in poor Cape Town neighbourhoods was “severe and chronic”3. In 2013, a survey of 2,500 households throughout the metropole found that food insecurity stood at 58%. Hardest hit were poor neighbourhoods: 95% of high-income neighbourhoods felt they had adequate nutrition for a year, but just 25% of homes in low-income areas could say the same. Yet another study in 2014 found that Cape Town “cannot be considered food secure”4. Although its impact is not yet fully understood, drought has dramatically impacted food security throughout southern Africa in recent years, with the United Nations issuing a warning early in 2017 that millions were facing starvation following reduced crop and livestock production.

Asked why the 281 hectares was excised from the PHA despite other land being available within the city (and despite hydrogeologist Parsons noting that the high water table was a “development

The city did have a massive housing backlog. But it wasn’t new.

the rezoning of the land. Enter John Coetzee, Director of Developments at Uvest Property Group. According to the Uvest website, Coetzee has “a formidable track record in the property development arena” and has “spearheaded some of the Western Cape’s largest integrated housing projects”. These include Burgundy Estate, Buh-Rein Estate and Belladonna Estate. If you’re looking to buy a place in any of these estates, you’re looking at about R330,000 minimum for a one-bedroom in Belladonna estate or up to R3.2-million for a four-bedroom in Burgundy Estate – arguably not real estate options for those on the housing list.

Coetzee is also no stranger to Roos and MSP. Back in September 2011, he worked as managing director at Roos’ MSP developments.

By 2015, Uvest had taken over from MSP, and was starting the process to get permission from various authorities to rezone several properties within the 281 hectares. It was to submit two rezoning applications pertaining to 15 properties, of which it owned 14.9 The first was needed because Uvest wanted to develop two erven, 5.7-hectares of which would be a commercial zone and 4.25-hectares of which would be occupied by a school. Ideally, they wanted to build a shopping centre, a school, and 781 parking bays. And the school, according to blueprints, is no ordinary educational haunt: it’s a Meridian school, managed by Curro. The fee structure doesn’t come cheap. Second prize would be covering the entire area with a mall.

There’s no mention of housing for those on the housing list.

ou’ll recall that there was a second piece of red tape to get out of the way:

disturbed activists: The department ruled it was not necessary for the city to do an environmental impact assessment before rezoning the land  to allowurban development. The rationale? It had not yet been (finally) decided what to build on the land. Only once a concrete application for building was in place, would an environmental impact assessment be required. In the meantime, it could rezone.

That was just over two years ago. Since then, Heritage Western Cape has refused the rezone, which Uvest has appealed twice, with both appeals dismissed. HWC approved the smaller rezoning application – for the parking lot and the mall – but the community disagreed.

The PHA Food and Farming Campaign has been fighting the above developments in the PHA for years, endorsed by 33 civil society organisations including the Kaapse Vlakte Landbou Vereniging, the Philippi Developing Farmers Association and the Philippi Horticulture Housing Committee.10 Nazeer Sonday, who spearheads the PHA Food and Farming Campaign, has been fighting this battle for a decade.

he letter from DEADP to the city brought with it more news that

In the meantime, Oaker’s application put the PHA under the microscope. It was about time, since Cape Town’s new Spatial Development Framework – or SDF – was on the cards; a 20-year plan to manage growth and change in the city.

The early months of 2009 saw a review of the available information on the PHA by SPUD, the City’s Spatial Planning and Urban Design Department, who also consulted with other departments including Water Service, Transport, Environmental Resource Management and Housing.

As in Uvest’s case, housing was placed under the spotlight: the massive housing backlog was raised. The Department of Housing complained – as suggested above – that every other land use was “prioritised over housing” and that “bio-diversity (and) nature always trump the shelter needs of the poor”. The decision-makers at Pepco – the City’s Panning and Environment Portfolio Committee, consisting of councillors and aldermen elected to serve the people – weighed the evidence. In May 2009, SPUD recommended to PEPCO that the PHA be recognised as an agricultural resource asset and that Oaker’s land remain a part of it. They also identified another 365 hectares within the PHA that would be more suitable to develop, since it was already being used for non-horticultural purposes like panel-beating and horse-rearing. SPUD added that additional studies were needed to assess the aquifer as a future source of potable water, and to determine the loss of the PHA in terms of food security and water resources. In short: tread lightly.

All this was moot, however: the national minister wrote back, and refused Oaker’s request.

This was an early example of what Capetonians will by now well recognise in the management of the water crisis: an ongoing disconnect between local, provincial and national government, and a persistent challenge in finding consistent

Oaker was disciplined by the Financial Services Board for inflating the value of the land by some 2000%, effectively cheating six pension funds.

 projected that there was still  enough land within the urban edge to accommodate the increasing need for housing until 2021.

And, adds Sonday, when the draft SDF was passed around for comment from civil society – standard practice – Oaker’s land was still demarcated as part of the PHA.

Bredell’s spokesperson Styan, however, said that a public participation process was followed.

Furthermore, council approval of the Oakland City Developmental Framework has since re-worded the approval to exclude subsidised housing, negating the claim that the development is socially justifiable. “It excludes the 1,200 families in the immediate vicinity of the PHA who live in informal settlements. These are the city’s citizens most in need, and are referred to extensively in both the SPLUMA requirements for development, and the PHA review document,” reads comment from approximately 20 civil society groups on the Environmental Impact Report for Oakland City. The same, they argue, goes for the private school.

In short, when farmers are battling a crippling drought, they argue, citizens’ food security is being placed in jeopardy through the excision of high-potential agricultural land from the PHA. This was justified to provide social housing that was needed urgently – except it may not provide social housing at all.

And then there’s another unintended consequence: in the long term, the property market also stands to lose if resources are unbearably strained. Cape Town has already begun to experience this, with water shortages affecting house prices.

Asked whether there will be low-cost housing for those on the housing list in Oaklands City, the city said that individual precinct plans for Oaklands City were still being prepared, and it therefore could not answer specific questions about the housing component of the development.

The city also stated that the provision of low-cost housing within the development could not be made into a legally binding requirement in the absence of any provisions for such conditions in the Municipal Planning By-law or in policy. However, although it was too late for the Oaklands City Development, the city said it was working on a proposed inclusionary housing policy and that it was “engaging with private developers about their role in affordable housing”.

And then there’s another unintended consequence: in the long term, the property market also stands to lose if resources are unbearably strained.

t the time Bredell amended the SDF, an October 2010 study by the city had just

for a 55-hectare open sand mine by Consol, which activists from the campaign are also concerned about and plan to challenge legally. They say it would irreparably compromise the integrity of the aquifer, with mine water reaching the neighbouring Ramsar sites of Zeekoevlei and Rondevlei within 20 years. They are further concerned that the mine will have consequences for the largest wetland in the PHA, which is home to 98 migratory bird species in winter and lush farmland in summer.

The EIA has been passed, however, and the activists’ appeal denied, with 300-hectares of prospecting rights granted. Consol’s atmospheric impact report and water licence use application make several recommendations for mitigating damage to the environment, and for now, that matter rests.

The study investigating the feasibility of a future mixed-use development on the PHA has also gone ahead, despite activists’ protests. It was won by Indego, headed up by one Karen Harrison, who was grilled by activists, civil society and members of the Standing Committee, a multi-party body appointed to oversee the management of the PHA, on 2 August 2017. The outcome is pending.

For the moment, the activists are contesting only the Uvest and Oakland City developments in court, following a lengthy process to get there.

On Friday, 15 September 2017, the campaign filed a case with the Western Cape High Court, challenging several decisions in the PHA relating to the above-mentioned developments. These include the city’s decision to excise the 281-hectares from the PHA, and the HWC decision to approve the rezoning of the two erven destined to be occupied by a mall, parking lot, and/or high-cost school. Sonday is one of the applicants in the case, due to be heard in 2018.

If the PHA Campaign wins, the land will remain as is for now. If they lose, Sonday could be personally liable for legal costs, because the campaign is run by volunteers like himself, at their own expense. Sonday will have to sell his smallholding in Philippi, and, simply put, lose everything. DM

new development, in a northern corner of the PHA, is the application