Gangster State

timber wall panels, explained Narsai in his letter. The manufacturing
process and construction on site had to be kept going with power
generators and water tanks. Even if the houses could all be finished
under such undesirable circumstances, the contractor would not be
able to connect them to services, he warned the director-general. It
appeared as if the local authorities and the provincial government had
done virtually no planning before they started spending money on the
project.
This was because immense political pressure was brought to bear so
that illicit funds could begin flowing to the political beneficiaries of the
scheme, said one of my sources.
By June 2015 , only five houses had been finished, according to a
progress report. ‘The current rate of progress is still of great concern as
the contractor will never be able to complete the expected 800 – 1000
houses within the 18 – 24 months construction period,’ warned the
report.^28 This was despite the fact that the FDC had by now spent
almost R 60 million on the project, according to its annual reports.
Tekeweni and VNA had been on site for more than a year, but the end
was nowhere in sight. The main reasons for the severe delays included
the late delivery of materials, a lack of fuel and a breakdown of the
manufacturing plant, the report found. Furthermore, many of the
houses that were still being finished had ‘external and internal cracks
... on the walls’.^29 By October 2015 , only 136 houses were finished.^30
The project was in serious peril, as all 1 000 units should have been
completed at this point.
The Vrede dairy project had by now become a national scandal, but it
was the housing debacle that threatened to boil over and spark serious
unrest in the normally quiet town. When the completed houses could