Ward 11 community leaders and the Community Police Forum are desperately trying to get the Department of Public Works to demolish an abandoned high school building as it has become a haven for criminals.
Ward 11 community leaders and the Community Police Forum are desperately trying to get the Department of Public Works to demolish an abandoned high school building as it has become a haven for criminals.
Benjamin Mahlasela high school, which was opened in 1996, shut its doors in April 2013, following a steady decline in enrolment.
The building now has become a free for all since its closure, with people stripping it and either selling the materials or using them to improve their homes.
In an interview last week, Ward 11 councillor Mncedisi Gojela said with the community police forum, his committee had begun talks with the department of public works.
Gojela said poachers use the building to slaughter livestock belonging to local farmers. "I will try to get the process speeded up," he said. "Every week I get calls from people who find the remains of their slaughtered goats in that abandoned school building.", Gojela said.
Headsman Ngetho, who lives nearby, said he often saw young men with donkey carts stripping and collecting material from the school. "Just a few days back they came in here and took the paving bricks," he said. "The police know about this and I've seen the police just driving past and doing nothing."
In an interview last year, District Education head Amos Fetsha said the three-storey building, which was to be renovated to accommodate the railway yard-based Amasango Career School, had been condemned.
Fetsha said that the Department of Public Works advised him that the building must be demolished after engineers had discovered structural defects caused by unstable ground.
The structural defects were discovered during an engineers' evaluation conducted to determine the costs of renovating the dilapidated building for Amasango.
Fetsha said the engineers’ report recommended that the Department of Education to identify a vacant plot elsewhere to house Amasango school.
Amasango Principal Linda Ngamlana said the school has identified land in Mayfield, but were waiting for Makana Municipality to approve their plans.
