Several Grahamstown home-owners raced to save furniture and possessions on Monday, as they found their homes ankle-deep in sewage.
Several Grahamstown home-owners raced to save furniture and possessions on Monday, as they found their homes ankle-deep in sewage.
Sewage flooded at least four houses in the same street in Extension 4. Streets in the area are unnamed.
Extension 4 resident Nobelungu Ndwayana showed Grocott's Mail the damage caused by the sewage in a relative's house. She said when she arrived at the house in the early hours of Monday, the owners had begun removing furniture from one of the affected rooms. She said municipal plumbers were called to attend to the problem.
"They did arrive in this area but they did not come here," she said. When Grocott's Mail arrived at the home on Monday, Ndwayana was ankle deep in the foul liquid as she tried to manage the situation.
Neighbour Bonisile Jamela said the problem had started the previous week.
"It started early last week and they came to work on it [the previous]Friday morning," he said. However, their efforts were clearly not enough, because, Jamela said, the sewage continued to flow through about four houses.
He said the situation was bad, because it affected how they did things around the house and was a health hazard.
Jamela said in 2012 municipal workers had dug a big hole in his yard, hoping to fix the problem. In the process they'd taken down his fence, he said.
"There was a blocked pipe. They asked to remove my fence and promised to fix it once they were done, but that never happened," he said. Apart from the fence, he'd lost valuable possessions that time, he said.
"I lost my carpet, a duvet and clothing that was on the washing line," he said. Another affected resident, Phikisile Labithi, said there was a leaking inspection cover in front of his yard. He said it had been in that condition for years.
Labithi said reporting problems to the municipality was not helpful.
"Nobody listens to people from the township.
"If this was happening in the suburbs in town, it would surely have been fixed by now," a frustrated Labithi said. Municipal spokesperson Yoliswa Ramokolo said there appeared to be a general problem with piping in Extension 4 and 5.
She noted that there were recurrent sewage overflow problems in the two areas.
