Metro police last week demolished another 40 illegal shacks in Crossmoor.

Allegations of councillors instigating residents to invade municipal have since surfaced. Minority Front, Councillor J Singh alleged that some councillors were trying to curry favour with potential voters by allowing them to occupy municipal land.

Police moved swiftly on last Tuesday afternoon and evicted at least 40 families from makeshift shacks before demolishing the structures.

Fuming residents said they are very upset because Metro police are continually harassing them. “Why don’t the police use their time to find criminals? Why are they only targeting us?” one of the residents said, sacred to reveal her name.

She said that there are so much of robberies, murder and hijacking in the area. “Maybe they (police) should concentrate their time on more critical issues than trying to rob us of a home and place to sleep. We are not hurting anyone. I have children and the weather has not been too good these last few weeks. Every time the police destroys our home, we have to rebuild it and it is a lot of hard work. We just want to live peacefully,” she said.

The initial 14 shacks that were built on the land last year were not destroyed by Metro because the owners had obtained a High Court interdict preventing police from breaking them down. Police only broke down the illegal shacks.

eThekwini Municipality's housing portfolio committee chairman, Nigel Gumede, welcomed the demolition and said that some councillors are involved in housing issues. He did not elaborate further.

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