During a surprise visit to the centre on Friday, Mqulwana was greeted by tall grass in the yard, bad smell in the rooms of old people, paint peeling off the wall and that men and women were mixed in the same room.

The centre is under the management of the City of Cape Town and is a residence to 17 pensioners. The pensioners pay R450 a month for food and accommodation.

Mqulwana said: “I did not like the fact that they are mixing men and women in a room. That is against the constitution. I am not really satisfied about the situation here. You can’t dish out food using your hands. The matter needs urgent attention. There is no way that people can live like this.

“I need a report from the Department of Health. The smell is very bad and the grass needs to be cut. It is important for my department to combine with City of Cape Town to improve the place. I have to intervene when I can see that old people are not comfortable.”

A pensioner better known as Gaba said: “The workers are throwing my food on the sink full of flies. They give me bread on my hand and when I complain they tell me to leave the place. I am not a child that they can give food on my hand. The workers here do not care. Sometimes they work two days a week.”

Gaba sold her house at Jabavu after she got frightened by people who knocked on her door at night and the police advised her to move to the centre.

Gaba is now cooking for herself in the centre regardless of her paying for food and accommodation.

Ida Klass who was born about 1940 said: “There are three people who have died here.

“I want to move out of here. I am not happy.”

Mqulwana also said she has been engaging with the City of Cape Town for more than a year about bad conditions in old age homes.

Vusi Magagula, manager: “The centre has been like this for a long time. Why do people only pay attention now?”

He also asked to be excused when City Vision asked him about the mix of women and men in the same room.

A daily newspaper reported that the oldies go to bed on an empty stomach and that they have to wash their clothes themselves.

Mqulwana said she wants to make sure that everything is in order before the end of her term of office which ends next year.