Will the reservoir take two more years to be completed?
Two years later and the Zulu Xhosa Reservoir is still in the excavation phase.
Tsakane – When the news of the new reservoir to be built in Tsakane came out, many residents were delighted.
Philip Msanga has lived in Extension 6 for the past three years and he says they have always had issues with water.
“Almost every week, I can say we had water cuts.
“And sometimes we would go without water for more than 24 hours,” he explains.
But he says the people of Ext 19, where the new reservoir is being built had it much worse.
He believed the reservoir would resolve this issue.
Philip works part-time at a shoe repair store close to the construction site.
The construction of the Zulu Xhosa Reservoir has been in progress for more than two years.
The process is still in the excavation phase.
“Normally the construction should not take longer than nine months,” explains Tom Ralph who is a civil engineer, upon inspecting the site.
In his expert opinion, the reservoir should have been completed in 2017, latest.
When work started, the Ekurhuleni Municipality Water and Sanitation Department had allocated R11-million for the project.
“There were a few issues that caused the work to be stopped at certain points.
“But two years is still a lot of time,” says Ralph.
In the Sixth Ordinary Mayoral Committee Meeting for 2017, the metro adjusted the R11-m budget to R48-m for 2017/18.
“We don’t know about serious things they talk about in the offices, but we only want them to finish.
“Sometimes water just flows out into the main,” adds Msanga.
The metro failed to respond to our enquiry by the time we went to print.
