TurnKey365 Property Management Group gave a group of 7 people who have been occupying a mansion in Cape Town’s Camps Bay area until 17:00 on Thursday the 24th to vacate the premises.
The seven queer “artivists” from the #WeSeeYouMovement booked accommodation at the luxury holiday home on Airbnb for the weekend, but informed the property manager on Monday they would be staying in the house “forever”, according to IOL. They have since been staying in the house without paying.
The group claims they’ve been occupying the Camps Bay mansion in order to draw attention to land and housing matters, and to create a safe space.
“Our action is part of a global movement of occupiers who do not have homes, particularly those who are close to home that are landless, cannot afford their rent or face violence in their place of residence,” Kelly Eve Koopman wrote in a statement on the “We See You” Facebook page.
“We are occupying in protest of the lack of safe space for queer people, women and children, in a country with disgusting rates of gender based violence”.
According to EWN, The mansion has six rooms, a pool and a jacuzzi, and the activists – who pooled resources from friends and family in order to book their stay, said that they’d been planning their action for months.
Koopman told EWN that during the COVID-19 pandemic and even now, many of the holiday properties in the area remained vacant despite there being urgent need for housing. Their occupation, she said, was a way of drawing attention to a broken system.
She also added that that particular area of the Cape Town coastline is rooted in slavery and inequality which has yet to be memorialised or recognised.
TurnKey365 Property Management Group, the group which manages the booking and maintenance of the house, issued a statement following what it deems “unlawful occupation” of one of its listed properties in Camps Bay, reports The South African :
“The guise under which the guests secured the booking has not only been dishonest but their ‘indefinite’ occupancy and refusal to allow staff onto the property has led to many staff unable to perform their duties resulting in a further compromise on their livelihoods and ability to support their families,” it said.
“In addition, much needed further bookings are being compromised resulting in a further setback for a small company already suffering and attempting to recover from the throes of COVID-19,” it added.
The management group then requested that, in order to protect the staff of the house and their families, as well as to accommodate an upcoming reservation, that the unpaying activists vacate the property by 17:00 today.
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