Residents of Klopperpark have said they are tired of having to fight for service delivery in the area. According to residents, service delivery has all but seized, slumlords have been allowed to build relentlessly and more than half of each day is spent without water.
Also, roads have not been maintained, sewage flows into homes from regular line blockages and illegal businesses have been allowed to operate unregulated. Residents also say they have to put up with regular illegal dumping, uncut grass, public drinking and street lights which don’t work. Last week residents invited the NEWS to a meeting where they aired their views.
The overwhelming response from those who attended was that residents in the suburb are tired of having to “beg” for basic municipal services. Roughly a month ago, residents started a petition to demand the City of Ekurhuleni recognises problems in the area and that officials take appropriate steps to deliver services to residents.
Michael Peter, who moved to the area in November, told the NEWS one of his biggest concerns was the number of illegal communes being built in back yards. At the meeting he said the bathroom and shower of one of the rooms built on a neighbouring property faces directly into his kitchen.
“One man was watching my wife in the kitchen while he was taking a shower.”
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Wendy Bowls has lived in Klopperpark for 38 years and fears what illegal constructions are doing to the value of her property. She said that while landlords are raking in large amounts of money and not paying tax, their tenants are living in unbearable situations.
Bowls shared that she was worried for the children growing up in the communes. Other residents at the meeting told the NEWS how bus operators and mechanics were allowed to operate, often discarding used oil in the drains and operating spray painting equipment in the open.
A resident, who identified herself as Cecilia, said often refuse collection does not take place on scheduled days.
“The bins are left and then we have to deal with maggots and the stench.” Jakes Nel, from the area’s neighbourhood watch, said the uncut grass in the fields poses a safety risk for residents and patrollers. He added that at times his water pressure is so low he cannot do his washing.
Nel pointed out that in some of the illegal communes as many as 43 people live in a two-bedroom house with no property sanitation. “Residents have begged council for two years to cut trees in the suburb and eventually had to do it themselves,” he said.
Nel also said the unmaintained municipal swimming pool in the area was a contentious issue for residents. “If the municipality doesn’t want to maintain the pool they should hand it over to the residents and we’ll do it,” he said.
CoE responds
The City of Ekurhuleni has said it is aware of the issues faced by residents in Klopperpark and the municipality was in the process of attending to various matters.
In response to questions sent to the City by the NEWS, spokesperson Zweli Dlamini said officials were aware of frequent sewerage blockages in Avongloed Street as well as low water pressure in the high-lying areas of Klopperpark.
Dlamini said City officials swept the sewer pipeline serving Avondgloed Street and will monitor the situation for any new complaints of sewer blockages.
“The City, in conjunction with Rand Water, is investigating water pressure issues and will decide on the action needed as soon as we have gathered sufficient information.”
Dlamini added that water and sewer-related complaints are attended to in 48 hours. He advised that should matters reported not be attended to in the specified timeframe, residents should escalate matters to the call centre. Commenting on other matters, Dlamini said door-to-door refuse removal for the area is scheduled for Mondays.
“From time to time service backlogs occur should a vehicle break down and there is no replacement vehicle to service the area.”
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He said backlogs in household refuse removal services are addressed the following day. Dlamini added that the removal of illegal dumping is scheduled once a complaint is received through the City’s service request system (Emis).
“The turn-around time for the removal of the illegal dumping is approximately seven days. “It must further be noted that the cleanliness of the City is not the sole responsibility of Council, but every resident and business have a civic responsibility toward the cleanliness of the environment we live in. “All residents/businesses are called upon not to litter, not to dump refuse illegally and to place out refuse only on the day of refuse removal,” Dlamini said.
Touching on the maintenance issues at the public swimming pool, Dlamini said the City is dealing with filtration issues as well as long grass. He urged residents to make use of the City’s My CoE app to report issues. Further comments on other issues raised were not received at the time of going to print.
*As your trusted community newspaper, the NEWS receives a number of service delivery complaints. Although the local media is a news platform and not a service delivery complaints platform, we take pride in being your community watchdog that holds those in power accountable. Through regular liaising and relationship building with our local authorities, we are often able to update readers on municipal matters in the public interest.
At the NEWS, we want to ensure consistent and quality feedback from the City in response to our media queries. To monitor this, the NEWS is introducing a 5-star rating system. Once we relay our readers’ pressing questions to the CoE, we will be rating their response according to a 5-star scoring system allocated as follows.
Two stars will equate to all questions answered (either direct or indirect); two stars will equate to the relevancy of answers to questions posed; and the remaining star will be attributed to adherence to the deadline for comment.
As Dlamini served in this discord, the NEWS has rated this reply with three stars = one star for questions answered; one star for answer relevancy; one star for deadline met.
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