The purpose of the study is to evaluate the housing process of Witzenberg Local
Municipality and determine the involvement of the community and their perception
regarding the whole process. The researcher is using a qualitative method to obtain the
views, perspectives and feelings of the participants. For the purpose of the study is data
collection limited to the sample population of people on the waiting list and those already in
possession of low-cost house of the seven townships in the Witzenberg Local Municipality
to. The researcher made use of questionnaires and interviews to collect data to make a
profound finding and recommendation.
In Witzenberg, 41% of households earn less than R30000 per annum (Witzenberg Local
Municipality 2012: Online) which indicate that the Witzenberg Local Municipality has a high
need for subsidized housing. The waiting list for low-cost housing in the Witzenberg Local
Municipality currently stands at 6278 of which 1478 are a blocked housing project and a
backlog of 4800 houses. The inhabitants of the Municipality received low-cost housing 8
years ago (Witzenberg Local Municipality 2012: Online).
Witzenberg Local Municipality does has a housing problem, which stems from finance,
affordability, insufficient land to erect housing projects, overcrowding, and quality of
housing, staff shortage, unemployment, uncontrolled farm evictions and community
involvement (Witzenberg Local Municipality 2007a:Online). Low-cost housing is in demand
to address the challenges.
Farm evictions, influx into the Witzenberg Local Municipality and forming of informal
dwellings and increasing of squatter camps hold a serious threat to build sustainable, quality
low-cost housing in the Witzenberg Local Municipality and with limit staff is in-flux control
very hard to manage. Although the homeowners of the Witzenberg Local Municipality are
happy to have received houses, they expressed much concern about the poor construction
work, overall quality of the materials used as well as the housing process adopted by the
Witzenberg Local Municipality.