A DOZEN families have moved out of shared housing and into their own new homes in Unit P, in Potsdam.

On Wednesday, 11 August, Executive Mayor Zukisa Faku handed over keys to the 12 excited families who were relocated from various Mdantsane areas. The 12 houses are among the 2 003 houses the City is building in Potsdam.

During the official handover, Faku spoke about the plan. "The project is set to eradicate the fights and misunderstandings of people living in sharing houses," she said, explaining the apartheid arrangement of two families living in separate houses but sharing a kitchen and bathroom.

Over 50 houses would be handed over to beneficiaries by the end of the month. "We are looking forward to giving more houses to those who deserve them."

Speaking to the media, Nontsikelelo Njotina, one of the new homeowners, said: "I don't have words to say. I'm excited to have my own house. It was very hard to live with another family for all these years. Now I'm free from fighting with my neighbours."

Njotina will live in her new house with her two children and one grandchild.

Beneficiaries are from sharing houses in Mdantsane and the Ikwezi Block 2 informal areas, with their challenges dating back to 1998.

Problems in sharing houses started when the former East London TLC and the provincial department of housing and local government implemented the Discount Benefit Scheme, which was to benefit disadvantaged people in East London.

Phase one of the Potsdam housing project, which began in March, consists of 500 units; in phase two, 1 503 houses will be built. These phases will be implemented in stages depending on availability of funding from the provincial housing department.

Already, over R194-million has been allocated for the project. Unit P will also eventually accommodate some 400 households from Ikwezi Block 2, which is on the border of the Unit P project site.

Already services including water, sewage and roads construction are nearing completion.