Few civic organizations in Cape Town have not experienced the frustration of having their environmental, heritage or need and desirability objections to a development ignored, overruled and generally dealt with contemptuously by the City.

Often this is in the face of well-reasoned, policy and law-based concerns that have taken many hours of volunteer time to research compile and present, sometimes with the added expense of professional input.

So well-oiled has the process-box-ticking machine become that decisions that are taken on appeal to the City are hardly given the time of day as uninterested committee members leave agenda items unread and professional opinions unconsidered.

In the view of most civic bodies the outcome of decisions to be made by the city are predetermined. Officials, it would appear, have been instructed that an approved proposal is a good proposal irrespective of urban edges, heritage overlays, wetlands, rare and endangered species or service infrastructure limitations.

This is a time-wasting and expensive farce. Residents’ associations are left with legal reviews as their only recourse, an insulting irony where the City uses citizens’ rates income to suppress the democratic process.

Kommetjie’s KRRA is deeply embroiled in such a battle for reason against an administration that has lost credible contact with us all. The autocratic power made available through the highly questionable executive mayor system compounds the problem.

Our objections going back ten years and more, along with costly appeals against an inappropriate, irrational and district-plan-flouting development that will add to the traffic chaos and loss of village character, have been dismissed and the review is underway, all R500 thousand of it.

“This is one for the people of Cape Town who are “gatvol” with the high-handed treatment and development-at-all-costs attitude of the municipality,” says chairman Patrick Dowling. Contributions, large and small, will go towards establishing a legal precedent showing that sustainable development is not just a cash cow.

The KRRA is still waiting for the judgement but the issue is so important to both sides that an appeal by one or other party to the appeal court in Bloemfontein is almost inevitable. 

Please consider helping us set a legal precedent that will be to the good of us all. Contrabutions should be paid into the KRRA account:

KRRA, Standard Bank, Fish Hoek (bc 036009), account number 374221065

Or made via
Save Kom Campaign :: Champion Page | BackaBuddy (click here to view)