The Constitutional Court has reserved judgment in a case involving the future of 12 poor Cape Town residents facing eviction from homes they have been living in for nearly two decades, says a Cape Times report. The residents had bought the houses through the Cape Town Community Housing Company (CTCHC) – a social housing development company wholly owned by the National Housing Finance Corporation, and formed to administer the delivery of houses in the city.

The Mitchells Plain houses were subsequently sold to a third party following residents’ failure to pay all the instalments, and they have been served with eviction notices.

The residents argued that their failure to pay was on the back of failed negotiations with the CTCHC to repair defects in the property, and the failure of the CTCHC to record the purchase agreement in terms of the Alienation of Land Act.

The CTCHC argued that evidence relating to alleged defects in the houses and poor treatment of them by the CTCHC was irrelevant. The body argued that continued attempts at depicting them as a ‘devious institution’ that followed strategies to deprive people of their right to houses should be rejected.

Full Cape Times report (subscription needed)