BCL evicts illegal occupants
Onalenna Kelebeile | Friday September 14, 2018 13:56
As some occupants relocated after the mine’s closure, those remaining decided to illegally allocate themselves rooms adjacent to theirs in a bid to better their living conditions as a majority of them stayed sandwiched with families in one small-roomed houses.
Staying with families was also against the mine’s housing policy as the hostels were designed for bachelors.
The illegal occupation resulted in the mine failing to keep proper records of housing units as some tenants surrendered their keys to the mine, claimed repatriation fees and continued to either stay or sublet to others who were not working at the mine.
The hostels also became breeding areas for criminals as they also illegally occupied empty rooms for their illegal operations, something that forced the police to appeal to the liquidator to take action.
The liquidator also received complaints from council over the compromised health and safety conditions at the hostels.
Another trend was that those who had their water supply disconnected would illegally fetch water from the hostels for use in their homes and the bill would to be paid by the mine.
Some of those who were evicted literally had nowhere to go and painful enough were facing the prospect of being homeless with their dependants who included babies.
Others were forced to move back to the one-rooms they were leased out. One of them said he decided to allocate himself a room next to his because the conditions they are living in with his family is not conducive, especially for their school-going children.
“Last week, we were called for a meeting at Meepong Secondary School where our children are schooling.
“There were concerns of a compromised learning environment being raised that affects the children’s academic performance,” he said.
The source who preferred anonymity said that he stays with his wife, a teenage daughter and a toddler in a single hostel room.
He also said that the school raised concerns that as a result of such conditions, some children are not attending school properly at the same time the school cannot allow transfers of Form 3s at this time.
“My child is doing Form 3. I had rented them a house in town but since I am unemployed I had to move them into this room with me and by allocating myself another room, I wanted to create a conducive learning environment for her,” he said.
Others confirmed that they illegally moved in after their relatives relocated.
Upon realising the rate of illegal occupations the liquidator, Nigel Dixon-Warren wrote to the occupants on August 23, 2018 giving them a 14 days’ notice to vacate the hostels including the rooms they were officially allocated because their actions amounted to a breach of the lease they signed.
Failure to vacate would result in him exercising his right by instituting legal action with costs borne by the occupant.
However, bowing to individually written requests for pardon from the occupants and Botswana Mine Workers Union and the area MP Dithapelo Keorapetse, the liquidator allowed only former employees to remain in the only rooms leased to them prior to termination of their employment.