Overview
- Amnesty International South Africa says the government has not provided adequate housing or essential services for more than five million people living in informal settlements.
- The organization characterizes housing and flood responses as “patchy and piecemeal,” pointing to under-resourced municipalities and poor urban governance.
- Most informal settlements lie in low-lying areas near riverbanks, leaving residents highly exposed to seasonal flooding intensified by climate change.
- The report cites the June 2025 Eastern Cape floods, which caused about 100 deaths and mass displacement, as an acute shock that deepened the crisis.
- Amnesty calls for dedicated budgets, settlement upgrades, and integration of disaster risk reduction into urban planning to meet national and international human-rights obligations.