6,000 houses to be constructed in South Africa by 2019

6,000 houses and subsidies are set to be constructed in South Africa by 2019; The Department of Human Settlements will administer the project.

Lindiwe Sisulu, Minister for Human Settlements confirmed the reports and said that as of 30 September, 2017, the department had delivered just over 4.6 million houses and subsidies. She confirmed this while speaking at the 11th Annual Govan Mbeki Awards recently.

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“We have so far constructed 1,029 houses per day and if we multiply that with an average family consisting of five people, we have provided shelter to 5,145 people per day. For every shack built since 1994, we have built 10 houses. These are facts that every South African should know,” the Minister explained.

National Housing Needs Register

This year, the Department of Human Settlements established a ‘National Housing Needs Register’- this is a database of all those who need houses and forms of housing assistance.

The database was set up so that they department can ensure that there is credibility in the process of allocating houses. The department, together with municipalities, is working to ensure that they have a credible national centralized database, making room for military veterans.

“The centralized database will include military veterans. We have been considering the possibility of taking over the provision of houses to military veterans from the Department of Military Veterans in total. Once negotiations are completed, our database will register all military veterans. We would like the Department of Military Veterans to transfer the money for the top-up to the Department of Human Settlements,” she said.

The Government Employees Housing Scheme

Additionally, The Government Employees Housing Scheme (GEHS) will be transferred to the Department of Human Settlements. This will assist in catering for that segment where FLISP (Finance Linked Individual Subsidy Programme) was not able to succeed.

The private sector should therefore strengthen partnerships with the department, so that they can help with the transformation of society.