The minister of public works and infrastructure Dean MacPherson has revealed that there are 338 hijacked government buildings across the country.
MacPherson disclosed that during a media briefing in Parliament, in Cape Town on August 28.
He said the department owns about 88,000 government buildings, with many of them being hijacked.
MacPherson said they are embarking on an audit to determine the accurate asset register, citing that there’s a need for the state to conceptualise what it wants to with its assets.
“There are 338 buildings that have been hijacked and I met with the mayor of eThekwini this week which also dealt with a number of bad buildings there.”
He said following his visit there, it is clear that the government does not use all the buildings and does not intend to do so.
“So, when we need to be optimising them, rationalising them and disposing of them, we call it what you will, but what we can’t allow is our buildings contribute to crime,” he said.
MacPherson said he can’t allow the buildings to continue to contribute to the high crime levels across the country.
Meanwhile, Sifiso Mdakane, the director general of the department, said there is a continuous process to determine the number of hijacked buildings in the country.
“The minister highlighted the hijacked buildings, and it's a continuous process of identifying those buildings as well, because there is a cost duplication when we don't have that. I think we spent about R11.8 million per annum on aspects of securing those buildings,” Mdakane said.
In Gauteng, at the City of Joburg metro, there is a scourge of hijacked buildings, mostly occupied by many low-income, unemployed, and disadvantaged people.
Hijacked, abandoned, dilapidated buildings, and shacks have become home for many families across the province in recent decades, as the province is increasingly under threat of overpopulation.
Thousands of people including children, women, and disabled children live without water and sanitation facilities, as well as electricity, and safety in those buildings.
Recently, a fire engulfed an abandoned and hijacked three-storey building in Jeppestown, where an informal settlement had been established.
According to Johannesburg Emergency Management Services (EMS) spokesperson, Robert Mulaudzi, the blaze was caused by illegal electricity connections.
The fire claimed four lives of people when the building they were occupying was gutted by fire and three others were injured.
Last year in August, a fire ripped through the Usindiso Ministries for Women and Children, a five-storey building in the Johannesburg CBD, killing at least 77 people.
This exposed the problem of hijacked buildings in the City of Joburg.
In a separate event, more than 123 undocumented foreign nationals were arrested on Tuesday, for illegally occupying hijacked buildings in the Point area in Durban.
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