Ongoing water woes in ward 27

WARD 27 councillor, Ernest Smith, is up in arms about the number of water leaks and bursts that have been reported in the Morningside area.

Smith said these ‘water woes’ not only affected residents, but businesses as well.

He said he had a list of cases in various roads in the ward, and felt he had to keep on top of this, so he could be accountable to residents and business owners.

Smith said a leak in Livingstone Road, Morningside, earlier this month, had affected nearby businesses, a school and residents.

He said he had reported the burst at 10.49am on 2 September via the municipal WhatsApp line, and only received a response at 5.38pm to ask if the issue had been resolved.

Smith then escalated the problem, and continually followed up for a day and a half. It was finally attended to, however he noted a further leak not two metres away in Lilian Ngoyi Road.

ALSO READ: VIDEO: No further action on Morningside water leak

Maria Teranes, business owner from Delphi Greek Taverna, said she had called the municipality but had not been able to get through to report the issue.

She had to buy 10 five litre containers of water to be able to run her business, a cost Smith said she shouldn’t have to pay because of delayed service delivery.

“A van came by twice to inspect the issue, but then left without doing anything. There was no water from 8.30am on 2 September until 9pm on 3 September and it was such a relief to have it back on,” she said. Teranes has run the business with her sister, Doddy, at the intersection of Lilian Ngoyi and Livingstone Roads for the past 19 years, and her parents had run a cafe at the site for 35 years before that.

“The problems with water outages in the area are just getting worse,” she said.

Smith said there had also recently been four leaks in Rosebank Avenue, another in Ferndale Avenue, there was a leak which was yet to be attended to in Trematon Drive, and a resident had reported another leak in Audley Gardens.

ALSO READ: WATCH: Morningside water leak continues unabated 

“These issues are indicative of the failure of municipal infrastructure. Time and again we have outages and water bursts, there needs to be serious action taken to replace the ailing infrastructure,” he said.

A leak in Milner Road, Morningside, which has been ongoing since March, seems to be receiving attention.

Resident, Beate Kleim, said she had noted danger tape had now been erected around the leak, however nothing more had been done.

Responding to request for comment on water leaks in the area, the municipality urged residents to report any water issues to the Call Centre number: 080 131 3013 or EWS WhatsApp number: 073 148 3477.  

Caxton Local Media Covid-19 reporting

Dear reader, As your local news provider, we have the duty of keeping you factually informed on Covid-19 developments. As you may have noticed, mis- and disinformation (also known as “fake news”) is circulating online. Caxton Local Media is determined to filter through the masses of information doing the rounds and to separate truth from untruth in order to keep you adequately informed. Local newsrooms follow a strict pre-publication fact-checking protocol. A national task team has been established to assist in bringing you credible news reports on Covid-19. Readers with any comments or queries may contact National Group Editor Irma Green (irma@caxton.co.za) or Legal Adviser Helene Eloff (helene@caxton.co.za). At the time of going to press, the contents of this feature mirrored South Africa’s lockdown regulations.  

Do you want to receive news alerts via Telegram? Send us a message (not an sms) with your name and surname to 060 532 5535.

You can also join the conversation on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram.

PLEASE NOTE: If you have signed up for our news alerts you need to save the Berea Mail Telegram number as a contact to your phone, otherwise you will not receive our alerts

Here’s where you can download Telegram on Android or Apple