Municipal service stinks. That's the opinion of residents in Paradise Road, near Grahamstown Station, who have been begging authorities to fix a burst sewage pipe since October.
Municipal service stinks. That's the opinion of residents in Paradise Road, near Grahamstown Station, who have been begging authorities to fix a burst sewage pipe since October.
Indeed, when Grocott's Mail paid a visit to Paradise Road, the sight – let alone the smell – was shocking. The grass in front of the two properties most affected was about a metre high – rampant, evidently, as a result of ample natural fertiliser in the form of leaking sewage.
Flies buzzed incessantly over pools of stinking water. "I can't even get my car out of here," said one resident, who asked not to be named, pointing to his abandoned car. The grass had grown so thick and high in front of his gate that it was impossible to open. He wouldn't mind cutting the grass on the verge himself, he said, if it weren't such a Sysyphian task.
"It becomes a problem when the water is like this," the man said, saying that if it weren't so richly nourished, the grass wouldn't grow so quickly. "All I am asking is that the municipality do their part and I will do mine. It will be easy for me to maintain my place if the water pipe is fixed." Anele Nohesi was concerned for his family's health.
"There are so many flies," said Nohesi, who said he was particularly concerned that there was a funeral parlour (Siyakubonga Funeral Parlour) nearby. "You see, now the problem is that we do not know where this pipe actually comes from," he said.
"What if the water comes from there? How safe are we and our children?" And in the heat of summer, Paradise Road was sheer hell, said Nohesi. "Now it is hot and we can't even open our windows at night because of the smell getting inside the house".
Nohesi said he was a plumber and wouldn't mind fixing the problem if there was an agreement with the municipality. "I can do this thing myself if there can be an agreement between the municipality and me," he said.
Adding to the residents' perception that the municipality didn't have their own interests at heart was that maintenance and repairs seemed to be carried out only during the lead-up to the National Arts Festival. "They came here just before the festival last year, they always do that and we don't know why only then." said Nohesi.
Challenged with this claim, municipal spokesperson, Thandy Matebese, sent Grocott's Mail to verify the claims. We got to the engineering department – only to be told that at that very moment there were municipal engineers already on their way to Paradise Road to fix the burst pipe.
When Grocott's Mail returned to Paradise Road, the situation was unchanged, but the resident who didn't want to be named said two men had indeed arrived in a Makana engineering department bakkie, had a look, and left.
So it was back to the municipality for our tenacious reporter – where enquiries staff said there had been no report-back from the engineers. Matebese confirmed this. Meantime, it's still hell for the residents of Paradise Road.
