Contractors are allegedly being held to ransom by criminal gangs who demand protection money in order for construction to continue.

Master Builders South Africa (MBSA) says building sites across the country are being taken over by criminal gangs.

MBSA which represents more than 4,000 construction companies, says criminal gangs target significant to large scale construction sites, demanding a cut of the projects earnings, and in some instances forcing the construction companies to sub contract work to certain individuals or businesses.

According to Roy Mnisi, executive director of Master Builders South Africa, this is happening all over the country.

“Since 2016, we’ve seen a loss of big and small projects affected by this so-called ‘local business forums’ who use violence to intimidate contractors onsite. It’s happening in the Western Cape, it happens in Gauteng, it happens in KZN. Actually it happens everywhere in the country,” says Mnisi

“The modus operandi is mainly intimidation, extortion, arson, assaults’ and in some instances, murder.”

Mnisi told Cape Talk, that their favourite demand is that of 30% of total project costs. So they’ll come onsite and say ‘we are aware of this project, we are local business forums and we want a share of the total contract amount.

“In some instances, they’ll say they want work that is equivalent to 30%. In some instances, they don’t even want to do any work. They just say, pay us a certain amount and we’re going tp protect you against other people coming to make demands.

Mnisi says they have been reporting these incidents to the law enforcement and the government but no action hasyet been taken.