COURT VICTORY FOR DISTRICT SIX RESIDENT

Eviction of 78-year-old woman overturned

- GENEVIEVE SERRA

THE Western Cape High Court delivered a landmark judgment, dismissing an eviction application against a 78-year-old woman. The court characterised the application as “opportunistic”, “disingenuous”, and ultimately “unlawful”.

According to housing rights activists and law group, Ndifuna Ukwazi, Noor-Banu Allie lives in a street in District Six that is among the few remnants to have survived the demolitions under the Group Areas Act.

Crucially, she has a pending land claim for a family home that the apartheid regime destroyed. This land claim is currently stalled in the second round of applications. The first round had not been finalised, leading to the creation of the second round by an Act of Parliament in 2014. However, the Constitutional Court later declared this second round unconstitutional in the 2016 LAMOSA judgment (Land Access Movement of South Africa and Others v Chairperson of the National Council of Provinces and Others.

According to court papers shared with the