Mounting calls for Vhembe district municipality to be placed under administration

Calls are mounting for Limpopo premier Stan Mathabatha to place the Vhembe district municipality under administration.

Political parties and citizens have had enough, after a two-week water shortage in Musina that left many shops closed, municipal offices pelted with stones, windows smashed, police vehicles set alight, and two teenagers, aged 15 and 16, fighting for their lives in hospitals.

Musina has, for the last fortnight, been a no-go areas area after angry residents took to the streets to protest about water.

They also accused the municipality of failing to stop a spillage of faeces and urine from dilapidated burst pipes and waste water treatment plants into the town and surrounding communities.

Mathodzi Mulaudzi of Extention 14, said: “For many years our streets, parks, and schools have been characterised by a bad smell. These people are useless.

All they know is to make one empty promise after the other.

“We want change in Musina or else all hell will break loose.”

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The Human Rights Commission in Limpopo also confirmed water shortages and the failure by the council to restore water in Vhembe was being investigated by the commission.

The Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF) in the province threatened to paint the town red tomorrow. Provincial convenor Mbuyiseni Ndlozi said the red berets will be picketing from 10am against police brutality and against the protracted shortage of water and sanitation.

Ndlozi said the EFF believed there was more to the alleged shooting of two minors, who are now fighting for their lives at the Mankweng and Polokwane Hospitals.

He said the EFF wanted to know who pulled the trigger that sent the two children to the hospital and also find out why the district was unable to provide clean running water to its people.

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Democratic Alliance member of the provincial legislature (MPL), Risham Maharaj said: “The district has lost R316 385 542, including interest, due to the illicit investment with the collapsed VBS Mutual Bank.

“We also note the pending visit of Minister of Water and Sanitation Senzo Mchunu to Musina and his hazy offer to assist.

“Limpopo is strewn with incomplete water projects in most districts, including the infamous billion-rand Giyani water pipeline project.”

Yesterday, the district said it was addressing the problem.

“We are currently drilling six boreholes while Venetia mine also drills additional four. This will bring to 10 the total number of bores currently being drilled in order to argument the water supply in Musina,” municipal spokesperson Matodzi Ralushai said on Thursday