Late last year, Eyewitness News reported about the bad state of a particular building in the city centre of Durban that became a dumping site and had raw sewage spilling into the lifts.

Ethekwini Mayor Mxolisi Kaunda. Picture: Nhlanhla Mabaso/Eyewitness News.

DURBAN - The Ethekwini Municipality intends to demolish hijacked buildings and any other derelict ones in the city centre.

This was revealed by Ethekwini Mayor Mxolisi Kaunda on Monday, who said the city started the process a while back.

However, he said due to some legal issues with the ownership of some of the buildings - it has been a difficult process.

READ: City officials, police involved in hijacking buildings in Joburg metro, says CoJ

Late last year, Eyewitness News reported about the bad state of a particular building in the city centre of Durban that became a dumping site - and had raw sewage spilling into the lifts.

When asked about this and the state of other buildings in the city, Kaunda claimed the city had long been working on getting rid of such buildings.

“With some, we are also in the court of law to get authority to demolish them, with some of them we are still waiting for amafa consent, so you can’t just demolish it, you need to follow all the steps that you need to follow and the exact consent that you are looking for.”

While the metro waits for permission, the council has passed a R28 million budget to demolish a privately-owned building.

@edtea_kzn officials say during the raid, they also discovered a syndicate issuing fraudulent trading permits (e.g. pictured below) to undocumented foreign nationals. pic.twitter.com/yDWeJhhk56

' EWN Reporter (@ewnreporter) May 14, 2020

As part of ongoing law enforcement operations spearheaded by @edtea_kzn, 15 undocumented foreign nationals have been arrested today for operating unregistered businesses. A dead rat and expired food have been uncovered during a raid in the Point Area.@NkoRaphael. Images supplied. pic.twitter.com/gF0uZGtG2Z

' EWN Reporter (@ewnreporter) May 19, 2020