The South African Property Owners’ Association (Sapoa) has appealed to Rural Development and Land Affairs Minister Gugile Nkwinti to invoke the discretionary powers available to him under the Spatial Planning and Land Use Management Act of 2013 to prevent “damaging gridlocks” in the property development sector.

The new Act replaced the much-vaunted Development Facilitation Act (DFA) of 1995 and was supported by Sapoa from a legislative perspective.

However, the organisation said on Monday that property development applications and appeals – besides other matters – were being affected by the transition, creating not only significant delays but also unnecessary bureaucracy.

“For this reason, we request that Nkwinti invoke a provision [within the Act that] allows the Minister to prescribe a date by which property development applications, appeals and other matters must be dealt with,” commented Sapoa CEO Neil Gopal.

The Minister had previously indicated that the new Act would be phased in over two deadlines, the first of which had seen the sections dealing with current DFA applications, the establishment of tribunals and the preparation of spatial development frameworks, becoming effective on July 1.

This would be followed by the introduction of the sections dealing with municipal land use planning and development applications of national interest, from September 1.

“[But] these dates have yet to be gazetted and are thus not yet official,” Gopal said.

In addition, Sapoa believed there were “signs” that the overall deadlines may be pushed back to February 2015, which it felt would exacerbate the situation faced by the property development sector.

A lack of professional capacity and a need to promulgate appropriate bylaws were considered the main reasons for the slow progress to date.

Noting the urgency of this issue, Gopal said the economic impact of delays and bottlenecks was “profound”, with data showing that the private sector in South Africa accounted for 61% of construction activity and provided employment for 828 000 people, or some 6% of the country’s total employment.

Research undertaken by Sapoa further stated that R20-billion of property developments were currently in the pipeline.

With an average completion period of 24 months, the association said some 50% of the value of this development pipeline would be lost yearly if delays continued.

“The overall negative economic impact on gross domestic product is estimated at R3.3-billion, while the loss of permanent jobs across the country is estimated at around 16 000,” Gopal warned.