Residents from Phalaborwa who walk to school and to work, say that it is difficult to walk past the stench of streaming sewage at Acacia Avenue, the R71 Road and Carel Mauch Street to name a few.
For over a week now residents have been struggling with an overflowing manhole at Carel Mauch Street and recently experienced the same problem at Acacia Avenue. Some residents, who live nearby, said the problem has become a health hazard to everybody.
”Maybe we should just learn to live with the fact that our town will always have sewage problems,” said a disgruntled resident to Phalaborwa Herald.
The sewage flows in a stream down Phalaborwa Acacia Avenue, and the strong stench which is in the air, is terrible and is a tremendous problem to residents. Residents feel that their plea is landing on deaf ears and some have even complained to the DA.
The Democratic Alliance (DA) constituency head in Limpopo, Desiree van der Walt, has laid a criminal charge against the Ba-Phalaborwa municipal manager, Maite Moakamela, and the Mopani District Municipal Manager on Saturday, August 28.
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This is not the first time Van der Walt lays a criminal charge against Moakamela as she had done so earlier this year, for a related case, in Namakgale. Desiree, just like in the first case, claimed that the municipal managers have contravened the Environmental Act, which states that everyone has ‘the right to an environment that is not harmful to their health or wellbeing. (i) Prevent pollution and ecological degradation,’ by failing to address the sewage problems in the municipality, even after calls to do so by the ward councillors.
“I received complaints from residents in town that the sewage next to the R71 towards the gate of Kruger National Park was overflowing like a ‘waterfall’ and that it is running down to the road,” said Van der Walt. She also stated that on Saturday, August 24, she did an oversight inspection at the R71 road, after having a meeting with relevant stakeholders and some disgruntled residents of town.
Phalaborwa Herald sent an enquiry to the municipality spokesperson, Jonas Mahesu, and the District Municipality Spokesperson, Witness Tiva. Jonas Mahesu has acknowledged that he has received the enquiry and that it was receiving the necessary attention, meanwhile Witness Tiva said that it was not necessary for the DA to have opened a case. “As the Mopani District Municipality we are not aware about the DA having opened a case against the institution on the state of sanitation in the town of Phalaborwa.
If they have indeed done so, it was not necessary for them to act in that manner, as we have a system which allows residents to report leakages on our water and sanitation infrastructure,” stated Witness Tiva.
He said that they had a team of technicians which worked tirelessly to repair bust pipelines in Phalaborwa and surrounding areas. “It is however important to note that as the district municipality responsible for Water and Sanitation in the Ba-Phalaborwa local municipality, we have made significant strides in replacing aging infrastructure, asbestos cement pipelines in particular,” he continued, also mentioning that it was the main cause of the leakages of both sewage and water. Asbestos cement pipelines have been put in place many years ago.
“We have managed to repair the Phalaborwa Sewage Treatment Plant which used to discharge raw water into a river which flows into the nearby Kruger National Park. The project is one of ten projects which has been earmarked for completion in the first 100 days in office of the Executive Mayor, and will be officially unveiled in two weeks time,” concluded Tiva. Moreover, on Monday, August 26, the municipality issued a notice stating that there would be no water in town from 06:00 to 21:00 as they would be performing repairs on a pipeline next to Bushveld Terrace.
