EDITOR – Potholes and leaks. This was reported on several months ago.
We have, and are still, running petitions. We beg the departments and the situation is no better. In fact, it is worse.
Our motorists are playing dodgems on crumbling, cratered and unmarked roads.
Slithering in sewage that pumps unabated in between neatly mowed, clipped and swept pavements that are desperately maintained by still houseproud residents. Shame Ekurhuleni. Shame Mr Mayor. No tar and no paint; the refrain continues.
Only potholes, leaks and sewage. How dare you stand up and brag about the state of the metro? It is a disgrace, an embarrassment, a mess.
We diligently phone the call centre and possibly (or not) get to talk to someone. This is after listening to a wailing voice assuring us of their awareness of load shedding. This is after numerous repeats of one’s name, phone number and the address of the offending issue. Eventually, you receive your reference number.
Invariably, that is where it ends. After a week or two or three, or even months, the pothole is still there.
Ironically, our social media advises us to only use off-road vehicles in Bedfordview. All else is liable to be wrecked. That is our service delivery.
Our frantic officials scramble around trying their best to get contracts in place, chasing procurement; but are blocked by the interminable red tape, politics and indifference. The appointed contractors appear for all intents and purposes, to be chosen for their astonishing lack of resources, capability or motivation. There is no intention to get anything fixed.
Employment by the metro is for the sake of employment; not for the sake of getting anything done.
Co-operatives do not offer the answer to post apartheid ownership. They merely emphasise the glaring weaknesses of this government.
No education, no training, no skills. A desperately disadvantaged society believing that by being weak together they will somehow be stronger.
Unfortunately, the result of this is horribly evident with the ongoing deployment of failed contractors, delivering failed projects, in a collapsing government.
Get your act together and clean up this metro.
CLR JILL HUMPHREYS
Letter received on August 21.
(Letter edited)
