Former president of the library, Sipho Mabaso said the garden had become a drug den masquerading as a skateboard rink, with friends peddling hard drugs, even to schoolchildren.
Mabaso said, “Graffiti has begun to cover the walls and the City of Joburg emblem, the steps leading to the main entrance are covered in grime. At night, the doors are a headboard for homeless folk. The escalators cannot be called clean, bookshelves are largely empty and, at one time there were no newspapers as the City had not paid the suppliers.”
He added that the City Library should be up to world standard in a so-called ‘world-class African city’.
Meanwhile, DA councillor, Percy Koji, said the library had become a frustration as it should have a positive impact on learning opportunities available to the community at large.
He said, “Learners leave their actual homes to come to the library with the hope to utilise resources and space allocated. But the books inside the library are also becoming irrelevant as they may not match with the current curriculum, which makes it difficult for learners and frustrates them at the same time as they can’t access relevant research books.”
He added that the parking area had become a filthy dumping ground.
In his response, City spokesperson, Nthatisi Modingoane said the City had a budget of more than R2 million to cater for Johannesburg libraries but said it was insufficient to cater for the diverse and ever-increasing needs of communities.
“The City Library is a well-resourced facility, with the best and most comprehensive collections that can only be compared to international metropolitan libraries,” he claimed.
Modingoane said, like everywhere else in the world, budgets for library books were decreasing, and there was a higher demand for electronic resources. He added that the use of the library grounds by homeless people in the evening and drug use during the day had been escalated to social development and Metro police. He claimed various blitzes were conducted at night to remove homeless people.
Modingoane said security guards stopped schoolchildren from playing or conducting illegal activities around the library, and that the use of roller skates had been addressed with the youth and the organisation responsible for encouraging it.
“As far as I know, this is the cleanest library in the City and is a pride for everyone,” Modingoane said.
