Vukani residents must travel to other wards to host funerals or indoor public events because their local hall is in such a bad state.
Vukani residents must travel to other wards to host funerals or indoor public events because their local hall is in such a bad state.
The hall serving the area in Silvertown, just behind Fingo Village’s Temba Santa TB hospital, used to host church services, artists’ workshops and a soup kitchen.
Now it only has broken windows, missing doors and memories of a time when some still remember it being used. Vukani resident Sivuyile Nkohla explains how the building fell into disrepair.
When Silvertown village still existed the hall used to host many community-friendly activities and made a huge impact on the area’s crime rate, Nkohla said. Then the village was moved to Vukani Location about 10 years so, leaving the hall with no immediate community to serve.
Old Silvertown residents still came back to use the hall occasionally and a caretaker volunteered to watch over it. It fell into disrepair in 2010 when the caretaker decided to stop looking after the hall, he said.
"We are experiencing many challenges, we can not do most of our activities anymore," Nkohla told Grocott’s Mail. "Now we have to go to Luvuyo hall, which is part of another ward, and sometimes it gets overbooked and we have to use tents for things like funerals."
"Back then we never had such challenges," he added.
Another former Silvertown resident, Bukelwa Kasika, said although they’re unhappy about not being able to use the hall anymore, even when it was functional there were problems like double bookings and break-ins.
Ward 8 councillor Brian Jackson says some groups have showed interest in using the venue.
"There’ve been a number of proposals, some people want to use it as a crèche and for arts purposes," Jackson said, "but it is now vandalised badly. "It’s probably going to be part of the Egazini project" he said.
The Egazini project is a new community arts, culture and heritage initiative that Makana Municipality is planning.
