The importance of environmental laws in housing developments: Lessons from the Diepsloot housing project

Abstract

South Africa comes from a past of great oppression where the majority of the citizens, especially blacks, lived in abject poverty and deprivation. Apartheid laws such as the Native Resettlement Act 19 of 1954 and the Bantu/Native Building Workers Act 27 of 1951 distorted access to natural resources and denied the majority of citizens basic needs such as water, land and clean air. In 1994, with South Africa’s new dispensation, there were serious social, economic, legal, moral and environmental problems. The post-apartheid government had to take immediate action to address these problems.