Kamini Padayachee and Lungelo Mkamba
TOP ANC member Makhosi Khoza has withdrawn from the contest for the position of eThekwini municipal manager because of threats to her life.
Khoza, one of four people shortlisted for the job, has spent the past two days attempting to remove hundreds of people who had moved on to her 6 000ha Hillcrest property.
She said the invasion, by people from the neighbouring Embo community, was linked to telephonic death threats and warnings she had received.
In one call, Khoza was told to “get out of the race” or she would “face the music like S’bu Sibiya and Wiseman Mshibe”.
Sibiya, the ANC eThekwini secretary, and Mshibe, a PR councillor, were gunned down in separate incidents earlier this year, which were believed to be politically motivated.
DURBAN27052011 ANC spokesperson Makhosi Khoza. Picture: SANDILE NDLOVU
INLSA
Khoza, the newly appointed ANC chief whip in the KwaZulu-Natal legislature, said she had received a second phone call from the same number, telling her to view the threat seriously.
“On Sunday morning, I received a call from my neighbour, telling me that my land was being invaded,” she said.
“I began to think this could not be a coincidence after the earlier phone calls. Why would people invade the land now?”
She said that the Embo community was entitled to land next to her property.
“They are entitled to the portion next to mine, but they started building on my land. When I went to speak to them, they were very hostile. This invasion is politically motivated and it is sad because the genuine needs of the people are being manipulated.”
Khoza said that she had written a letter, withdrawing her application for the municipal manager’s job, to the municipality yesterday.
“In the letter, I explained that my land had been invaded and there were threats against me.”
She said that the metro police were alerted, but she was advised that she would need an interdict to evict the people.
“My lawyers will lodge papers and try to get an urgent application heard tomorrow (today) to secure an interdict.
“It is very painful that people have done this, because I was in negotiations to give land to the Education Department for a school to be built, but now I am reconsidering my options,” she said.
A spokesman for the Embo Westriding Trust board said that the people were not invaders.
He showed The Mercury a copy of a title deed, which indicated that a 5 000ha plot was left to the trust by a woman in 1998.
“I do not understand why Makhosi Khoza called the metro police. She should come to speak to us if there is a problem over the boundaries of her land and the land owned by the Embo community,” he said.
One of the men who was building in the area, said he needed land to build a home.
“I won’t allow it if she (Khoza) tries to remove us. We just want a place to stay; we need shelter,” he said.
