Call to stop City's Masi expansion plan

Civic associations and community organizations in the Deep South, including the Far South Peninsula Community Forum, have called on residents to sign a petition against City of Cape Town plans to destroy a community neighbouring Masiphumelele to build housing.

Sign the petition here by end of day today.

Click here for pointers about what to say in the petition

KRRA attended a Far South organised meeting in Capri to discuss the Lochiel Road Small Holdings (LSH) response to the City's spatial development plan, which includes dismantling the community through relocations, which according to the Petition on Change.org is "repeating the tactics that tore communities apart under apartheid".

The community claims that they are an integrated and productive community who turn waste into food, create jobs and build businesses, and cultivate genuine integration, but the City is using "the same old patterns of apartheid spatial planning, moving people around to suit those in power rather than building communities that work for everyone".

"Back then, families were uprooted and forced into places like Ocean View and the Cape Flats. Today, those same families and their children have worked hard to rebuild their lives here. Now, the City plans to undo that progress by displacing them again. True spatial justice means finding solutions that protect vulnerable communities instead of destroying them. Cape Town can and must do better than repeating history."

"The residents of LSH have tried to work with the CoCT to find solutions that help house people without destroying their community. The CoCT has ignored our engagement and doubled down on acquisition and displacement in their new spatial development plan."

Patrick Dowling of the KRRA said after the meeting in Capri: "The legacy of apartheid spatial planning has to be tackled from within communities finding each other in common space through an organic, not imposed process. The fears and unreasonable expectations that could be stirred up by such an exercise, especially one with numerous factual flaws, are unlikely to contribute to societal improvement.

"Once upon a time Kommetjie road was officially classified as a scenic drive, appropriate for a sub region that mostly relies on tourism, recreation, hospitality and the great outdoors for its economic lifeblood. Then it became an "activity route" to accommodate light industry. Now it could turn into a pell-mell development track, short of services, vision, certainty and the kind of community camaraderie that the country so badly needs. This avatar of the plan needs to go back to the drawing board," he said.

WHAT THE PETITION SAYS

The Lochiel Smallholdings are a community that borders the township of Masiphumelele. It is also one of Cape Town's most remarkable neighbourhoods. We are a thriving, multiracial community with nurseries, urban farms, businesses, and multigenerational households. Our city calls our smallholdings “mostly underutilised”, favouring it over VACANT land nearby.

Yet our 2018 survey shows a Hub of Economic, Agriculture, and Community building activity

• 32+ small businesses

• R50 million per year contributed to the local economy

• 236+ jobs created for local residents

• 90% of employees are local Masiphumelele residents

• 100+ tonnes of organic waste from the Deep South is processed here for local food production

• Productive urban farming provides support for growers in the valley

• Multiple nurseries and landscaping businesses serving the entire valley and the Cape Town film industry

• Churches, schools, after-school programs, early childhood support, and safe houses provide community support and are a safe haven for children and teens.

• Our preliminary 2025 survey shows that these numbers have grown even more over the past seven years.

What is the City of Cape Town Planning to Do?

In their final Local Spatial Development Framework (LSDF), the CoCT wants to destroy this community by acquiring properties to build temporary relocation areas (informal housing that they anticipate may become permanent) and cram 1,350+ households from Masiphumelele's wetlands into the LSH.

The City's Plan:

• Use Lochiel Smallholdings "for the expansion of Masiphumelele"

• Acquire 6.5 hectares of LSH properties.

• Create temporary relocation areas (informal housing) that “may become permanent”

• Then transform the area and acquire remaining privately owned land for high-density housing.

• Later build 4-storey apartment blocks for relocated households

They’re planning for urgent acquisition of a few properties to trap the remaining properties in a “steep income interface” with a spatial plan to eventually acquire all of LSH. This is after owners refused outright expropriation. This is coercive expropriation- making conditions so bad that “voluntary” sale becomes mandatory.

Residents of the Lochiel Smallholdings are not against housing, but we are against the CoCT’s behavior of arbitrarily displacing people and destroying established communities and livelihoods. Our city can do better than this.

Why This Matters For the Local Economy:

Devastating job losses in an area with high unemployment

Loss of essential services (nurseries, farms, schools, churches, small businesses).

Economic activity worth millions will vanish

For Spatial Justice:

Wealthy areas remain protected and untouchable

The most vulnerable bear the cost of the City's failures

Vacant land and city-owned land options are ignored because developers have approved plans or they expect strong opposition from middle and high income neighbourhoods.

The LSH Community's Vision:

LSH residents want to be partners in solving housing challenges, not victims of them. We envision:

• Mixed-use development that preserves existing farms, businesses and homes

• Innovative housing solutions across the far south that doesn't destroy the community fabric

• Collaboration with Masiphumelele residents to create integrated, sustainable neighbourhoods

• A national example of how township upgrades can work for everyone

  
  

We support housing AND people.

What's at Stake:

This isn't just about one neighborhood. It's about whether Cape Town will:

• Destroy successful integration in the name of temporary housing delivery

• Sacrifice productive communities to cover up planning failures

• Repeat apartheid's logic of moving people to suit government convenience and preferential treatment of high income developments

• Choose the easy path over the right path

  
  

The Lochiel Smallholdings represents hope—hope that economic opportunity can grow organically, that sustainable living is possible, that integrated communities can be normal. The CoCT is about to destroy that hope because it's easier than finding genuine solutions.