Violet Patake and her son, Sethapa Phosa live in this tent and still waiting for an RDP house
For the umpteenth time in her 48 years of existence, Violet Patake has lived below the poverty line.
She has been without a decent house only confined to a zinc sheet shack in deep rural Madumeleng village in the Bolobedu area in the Greater Letaba Local Municipality.
The single mother of a 20-year-old son, Sethapa Phosa is sharing a single room made of tent with the youngster without privacy.
During a recent phone interview with Mopani Times, Patake said the municipality promised her a low-cost Reconstruction and Development Programme (RDP) house.
The RDP house has always been a South African social-economic policy framework implemented by the governing party, the African National Congress since the new democratic dispensation since 1994.
Patake said she was elated when she was promised an RDP house back in 2020 but that promise has just been a utopian pipedream for four years now.
She said “I’ve been longing for this house for many years. My son and I have been sharing a limited space. You can imagine sharing such a confined space with an adolescent. The most painful thing is that we are unable to have romantic relationships because we can’t bring our partners into the shack or the tent. We cook, bathe and sleep in here. The tent is the kitchen, bedroom, bathroom and a living room.”
Patake is one of the man South African villagers living below the breadline, sometime sleeping on an empty stomach.
“I am currently unemployed and so is my son. We both survive on the meager social relief of distress since the outbreak of Covid-19. We struggle to make ends meet especially with groceries so expensive.”
She said a few day ago she was visited by government of officials who advised her to demolish the shack to create space for the envisaged RDP house.
“We are hoping that this is not just lip service and empty promises from the comrades. The officials who visited us said in a few days they will deliver building materials for the construction of the house” she said.
However, spokesperson for the Greater Letaba Local Municipality, Lovers Maenetje said it was not incumbent upon the municipality for the provision of houses.
She said “We only facilitate a few things here and there but the responsibility to build houses is the obligation of the provincial Department of Cooperative Governance, Housing and Human Settlement (CoGHSTA). I don’t know what happened to her house but the municipality does not build houses.”
Efforts to get comment from CoGHSTA spokesperson, Tsakani Baloyi could not yield positive results at the time of going to press.