The news has been full of stories of the demolition of poorly built houses, the deployment of corruption busters to clean up dirty housing deals - and now, allegations of over-expenditure on communicating housing-related matters to the people.
Many of us, who spent years developing and fine-tuning the nation's human settlements policy under former Minister of Housing Lindiwe Sisulu, have been dismayed at the persistent manner in which the new human settlements administration has sought to position itself by publicly eroding our achievements.
While it is heartening that the new human settlements administration has ensured continuity of some of the most important programmes we initiated, the manner in which Minister of Human Settlements Tokyo Sexwale has ridden roughshod over the achievements of all who preceded him has been disheartening and disempowering.
Without any razzmatazz, Minister Sisulu launched a national Rectification Programme in 2007 to address shoddily built homes. "Rectification" has been re-branded "demolition", a most unfortunate turn of phrase in a country with a two million home backlog.
Minister Sisulu also quietly introduced the Special Investigation Unit to the housing corruption-busting fray, in 2006, and the unit recorded many notable successes. She never bothered about photo opportunities for the front pages.
The A re Ageng Mzansi project - now, for purposes of propaganda being likened by the DA and liberal media to Sarafina 2 - was another notable success. This project - combing industrial theatre with a holistic communication campaign, housing registration desks, exhibitions and question-and-answer sessions - spoke directly to the communities we wanted to speak to, in language they understood.
The DA participated in signing the project off when it was presented to parliament, and the project was introduced to, and applauded by, the Housing Portfolio Committee at the budget vote in 2008. Minister of Human Settlements Tokyo Sexwale saw it twice, and he, too, applauded.
It was a massively effective communication platform, a worthy response to the instructions of both parliament and the High Court to communicate the new human settlements plan - known as Breaking New Ground - more effectively to the people.
In this context, Minister Sexwale's remarks on a national radio station that he had cancelled the project, and, "there is no time to play games and finance plays that have got nothing to do with the construction of housing", miss the point.
We are proud of our record in the Department of Housing under Minister Sisulu. We are proud of the human settlements policy we authored, the 1.5 million homes we constructed, the prototype human settlements we developed, the new two-bedroom homes - our contribution to understanding and building the developmental state.
We are proud of the efforts we took to engage the people, including the imbizos, and A re Ageng Mzansi - and the life skills courses we provided for first time homeowners, our customers.
But mostly, we are proud of the homes we built, because it is on what we produced that we can be judged. It is regrettable that the critical delivery of housing is being subverted into a demolition derby for the sake of playing to the public gallery.
Dr Clarence Tshitereke is a senior researcher at the Ministry of Defence and Military Veterans. He was previously Chief Director the Ministry of Human Settlements.
Issued by Oryx Multimedia on behalf of Dr Clarence Tshitereke.
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