“Our Yacht Club was stolen,” – Fisherhaven residents

Opinion by Gerard Grobler / Whalecoastreport

FISHERHAVEN — More than 200 residents packed Saturday afternoon’s Democratic Alliance (DA) public meeting at the Fisherhaven Academy, with many in a fighting mood. The Overstrand Municipality’s controversial handling of the Fisherhaven Yacht Club tender has clearly driven a wedge between the local community and municipal leadership.

The lease was initially awarded to Point Caravan Resorts (Pty) Ltd, a company tied to Mayoral Committee (Mayco) member Clinton Lerm. Although the municipality later cancelled the agreement after Point Caravan reportedly failed to meet key suspensive conditions, the company was nevertheless granted a temporary lease. In August, Council voted to put the property out to tender once again.

Lerm, who has since been named the DA’s mayoral candidate for the Overstrand, bore the brunt of the community’s criticism. Despite the heated atmosphere, he remained composed and promised to raise residents’ demands for broader public participation with both the Municipal Manager and the property management department. This included revisiting resolutions on the proposed tender put forward by the local ward committee as far back as 2017 (see our video interview with Lerm and his legal advisor, Anton Coetzee, who is favoured to become the Overstrand’s next Speaker).

Listen to a short audio excerpt from Saturday’s meeting below. The quality is not all that good as I was quite far away from the speakers, but it is nevertheless interesting to hear some of the points they raised.

About the author: editor

The Editor and publisher of Whalecoastreport