A black Economic Empowerment consortium is investing R150 million in a shopping complex for Butterworth and its neighbouring villages.

The Daily Dispatch learnt on Thursday that the Mnquma Municipality had already entered into a development agreement with the Nogoduka Ngumbela Consortium to build the upmarket shopping mall at the site which currently houses the town's stadium.

The planned development will have national retailers as tenants and will be linked to an improved taxi and bus rank, bus ticket office, municipal and government offices, hawker stands, toilets and parking bays.
 

Construction is expected to start in April and carry on for 18 months.

"We are looking at launching it before the end of the month,* acting municipal manager Sipho Mengezeleli revealed yesterday.

The mall, which forms part of the town's urban renewal plan, is expected to give the ailing Butterworth a facelift.

Acting mayor Ndyebo Skelenge said the shopping mall would create about 1000 jobs.

Skelenge said the land earmarked for the shopping complex had been leased to the developers.

"We will never sell that land. We will lease it so that the municipality can survive by the rentals accrued from the lease," he said.

Both Nogoduka Ngumbela Consortium chairperson Livingstone Nogoduka and his partner Mthetheleli Ngumbela were born in Butterworth..

"Butterworth is underdeveloped and poverty is sky-high and shops in the inner town are congested," Nogoduka said.

"There will be a complete change and there will be more shops in the form of national retailers, more employment and a change in the flow of people from Butterworth to East London to do shopping for minor things like stationery," he said.

Nogoduka said they would relocate the stadium at their own expense.

Mengezeleli said the stadium would be relocated to land near the golf course.

Daily Dispatch
 
Publisher: I-Net Bridge
Source: I-Net Bridge