City of Cape Town clarifies the closure of Otters' Creek Junior School

Eddie Andrews, deputy mayor and mayoral committee member for spatial planning and environment

Given residents’ interest in this matter and the importance of community facilities, the City of Cape Town seeks to provide more clarity and information about the recent notice of closure of the Otters’ Creek Junior School.

The City remains committed to ensuring that development across the City takes place in a lawful, safe, and responsible manner. Where challenges arise, particularly in cases involving schools and community institutions, the City seeks to apply the law with fairness while advising affected parties on areas of non-compliance and the steps required to rectify or regularise their applications in line with planning requirements and the Municipal Planning By-law (MPBL).

The MPBL regulates development and land use across Cape Town. It ensures that all properties, buildings, and land uses are lawful, safe, and aligned with the City’s spatial planning framework. All of us, whether living, working, or doing business in Cape Town, have a shared responsibility to comply with the provisions of the MPBL.

Compliance is not just a legal requirement; it is essential to ensure that development happens in a way that protects residents, promotes fairness, and safeguards the character and safety of our neighbourhoods. When land is used appropriately and within its zoning rights, it helps prevent conflicts, ensures access to basic services, and supports the orderly growth of our city.

The City is committed to upholding the MPBL without bias and in a consistent and fair manner. However, we are equally committed to assisting institutions in understanding and meeting the requirements for compliance. We aim to ensure that facilities serving the community can continue to do so safely, fairly, and in a manner consistent with sound spatial planning principles.

We have empathy for the parents, pupils, and broader Ferness Estate community regarding the recent notice of closure of Otters’ Creek Junior School. Unfortunately, the school has been operating illegally since 2019 from a property that is zoned as Single Residential, which does not permit a place of instruction as a primary land use right.

As part of our commitment to transparent and supportive planning processes, officials from the local planning district will be available to engage with the applicant during the pre-application phase, in line with the provisions of the MPBL. The land use application will have to comply with the provisions of the MPBL and will be assessed on its merits. A public participation process will also be required to allow surrounding neighbours and property owners to comment on the application before any decision is made.

While the City must apply the planning by-law consistently, we remain sensitive to the impact such matters have on families and communities. Our approach is to guide and support applicants through the proper legal channels so that community-serving facilities can continue their work in a way that is lawful, safe, and beneficial to all residents.

Founder and Managing Director of Otters' Creek Junior School, Yumna Allie, responds:

Otters Creek Junior School is in existence for eight years. And since the very start of the school, we applied for compliance. There have been numerous challenges, and every time we tried to mitigate those challenges, we just faced more and more challenges. Our school is operating without compliance, but not because we haven't made every effort to meet the required criteria for compliance. In fact, when we bought the property in 2017, I tried to apply for consent use before we opened the school, but I discovered that the City of Cape Town actually had no building plans for that property on record. This is a setback caused by the city. 

I was then forced to draw as-built plans, which delayed my initial application. We restarted the rezoning process in 2021 after an attempt to apply for consent use failed between 2018-2020. The rezoning application process was managed by a professional town planner, and the process only concluded in 2025. Even our appeal sadly failed. We were asked to do a noise assessment and a traffic assessment, but these were not accepted.  

We were served with a letter by the City on Tuesday, September 9, to inform us to cease activities by the 11th of November. This instruction from the City of Cape Town caused enormous distress for the parents, the children, and the staff who are earning their living at the school. We decided to look for alternative premises, which we are still currently looking for - premises that can fit into our budget and premises that are easily accessible for parents, and premises that are suitable for the children.

But in the meantime, we are still engaging with the city to submit a new application for consent use to the City of Cape Town to give us another chance to apply. Hopefully, they will assist us in overcoming the technical challenges we faced with our first application.

The Deputy Mayor, Eddie Andrews, has reached out to assist. I am very positive that we are moving in the right direction. Thank you