Dreamhouse promised to Ontlametse Phalatse's mum is still a pile of sand

Three years after the death of famous SA progeria sufferer Ontlametse Phalatse, her mother is still waiting for the new house promised by former president Jacob Zuma. TimesLIVE visited Bellon Phalatse, 48, this week at the family home in Hebron, that she shares with relatives. She is despairing at ever seeing the dream home that she and her daughter had spoken of.

“I’m going in and out of the hospital and being treated for depression,” she said. People say they want to visit me and my son to see our new house,” she said, referring to her second child, Tshimologo, 28. “Sometimes I’m embarrassed to go out.

Ontlametse Phalatse‚ who was 18 when she died in April 2017‚ was the first black child in the world to be diagnosed with progeria, a disease that causes rapid ageing. She cheekily called herself “the first lady”. She was regarded as an inspiring figure and a miracle child after outliving doctors’ predictions by four years.

She met Zuma at his official residence to mark her birthday‚ which was on March 25 that year. The presidency said at the time that the Jacob G Zuma Foundation would work with the Ontlametse Phalatse Trust to help her. Zuma invited Phalatse and her mother to celebrate his 75th birthday in Soweto in April that year, but she died before she could attend. At her funeral a few days later, held in Hebron, an hour from Tshwane, Zuma said: “I wanted to make her happy and ease her life.

“She told me she wished for two things: to have a car‚ and I said‚ consider it done. Then a house. That too [I said] she should consider done‚ because I had planned to build her house in which she could move in around June this year.

Partially making good on his promise, after her death‚ the then president gave the car to her grieving mother. In June 2017 Phalatse was offered an RDP house in Nellmapius Ext 22, near Tshwane, but it had already been promised to another person. The handover was cancelled.

Phalatse showed TimesLIVE the empty plot in Galabatsane village where she had hoped to live with dignity in a new six-room home. The overgrown yard only has a one-room shack in a corner, which she helped build to store building supplies, and a mound of sand.

A company conducted a soil inspection on the stand last year, saying it would be sent to a laboratory. A contractor delivered sand and promised to return and start building. But nothing has happened since. I remember when the officials visited us and asked my beloved daughter what kind of house she wanted and she described it. It was a beautiful dream house,” she said.

“My daughter’s spirit is not at rest … I’m pleading with government for answers so I know what to do, because I can’t do anything at my stand,” the unemployed mother said.

The presidency referred queries to the department of human settlements. In response to TimesLIVE questions, the department said in a statement it had “been engaged in finding a lasting solution to the issue of providing a house to Mrs Phalatse since challenges emerged about allocating them in Tshwane”.

“Discussions were held, in consultation with the family led by Mrs Phalatse,” and land was identified on a serviced site in the Hebron area. This site has already been fenced and the plan for the house submitted and approved by the concerned Tribal Authority.

“The construction of this house will begin in earnest, following a long tendering process by the National Home Builders Registration Council, an entity of the national department of human settlements, using alternative building technology.

“The family as mentioned, is fully aware of the process and is happy. Phalatse told TimesLIVE in an update later in the week that officials had visited her and apologised. They took the house plan to be stamped and promised construction would resume.