135 days without water, Tongaat residents take to the streets

The community in Hambanathi in Tongaat, KwaZulu-Natal, have been without water for over 135 days.

The town’s 40 000 residents have been without water since the April floods. Residents took the streets on Thursday, to protest against the lack of water.

They say the eThekwini Municipality is violating their basic human rights.

Four months after the devastating KZN floods, some residents are still struggling for water.

The Tongaat Civic Association (TCA) has been in battle with the eThekwini Municipality, Umgeni Water and the provincial Department of Water and Sanitation to have their water supply restored.

In a Facebook post, the TCA says they have endured far too much in the past 4 months of the water crisis in Tongaat.

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“Our basic human rights have been violated as citizens of the eThekwini Municipality. We do not have tapped drinkable water in excess of 50% of Tongaat community since the floods in the province were declared a National Disaster.”

“We have had deaths and injuries in our communities due to water shortages. Our pleas as a community have fallen on deaf ears. The municipality has failed us as citizens in ensuring our basic human rights are not violated.”  

It says the time has now come for the community to demand national intervention.

“We urge all civic organisations, religious bodies and organs of civil society, business and business houses and the community at large to take a stand together in one voice. We are all facing this crisis together, and we all fight for our human rights not be violated in this manner.”  

During the protest residents burned Jojo tanks to vent their frustrations over the 4-month long water outage.

A water treatment plant in the area was damaged earlier this year, and a delay in a tender process to repair the plant is affecting the water supply.

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