Construction of the long-awaited low- and medium-cost housing development north of Randburg is to begin next month, Gauteng housing MEC Nomvula Mokonyane said.

The R224m Cosmo City development will see about 3000 residents of informal settlement Zevenfontein move into houses next to the Dainfern suburb.

About 8000 houses would be built in the area, with construction expected to start on November 1, Mokonyane said.

She said the project was likely to be completed within a year.

The integrated housing project has, however, been put on hold several times following objections from a group of residents calling themselves the Jukskei Crocodile Catchment Area, who argued that the project would negatively affect property prices in the area.

In February this year, the Johannesburg High Court dismissed with costs the residents' application for the project to be halted.

"That (the opposition to the project) is strange because the very people they do not want on their doorstep are the ones who clean their houses and work on their gardens," Mokonyane told hundreds of Zevenfontein residents at the launch of the project.

She said the objections were racially motivated.

"We want to do away with separate development. The people who are objecting to this development want to see black people living in their backyards forever. This government will not allow that. We want to bring back the dignity of the African child," she said.

The project was also in line with government's strategy to eliminate informal settlements.