Ward 88 residents protest lack of service delivery and corruption
The group members spontaneously organised themselves as frustration reached boiling point as they hope support for their new 'movement' will grow.
Frustration at a lack of service delivery across the city is something most communities have in common. In Ward 88, however, residents have reached levels of angst which propelled them to brave freezing temperatures to stage a peaceful protest.
Held symbolically in front of the Roosevelt City Power substation, they met along the main arterial Beyers Naudé Drive at 06:30, ready and in place by 7am – just in time to be seen by the maximum number of people during rush-hour traffic.
Michael O’Donovan, unofficial spokesman for the group said, “The community is angry about a wide variety of service delivery crises and corruption. This is not about load-shedding; we understand that is on the cards right now. This is about the power outages that follow load-shedding, which leaves people for days without power at times. It is about water problems, road quality deterioration, neglect of infrastructure, and so on. We are fed up and angry.
“This is a warning of what is to come from us. Unless things start improving in the city and in our ward, rate bill boycotts are one of the options being seriously considered and are definitely on the cards. It is clear that elections and proportional representation is not working.
“All the city is doing now is reacting to things that are broken, which is expensive rather than doing preventative maintenance. It is unacceptable and there is no oversight.”
The group came together spontaneously – and in less than 48 hours of organising with a WhatsApp group being created to communicate plans to those interested in participating, managed to get a few dozen people to attend. “This is the beginning of a movement that we hope will garner more support from people across the board as we are a-political and everyone is welcome,” said O’Donovan.
At the time of going to press, City Power said that contractors whose contracts ended last week have been replaced by new technicians. A spokesperson for the entity Isaac Mangena said, “There is no crisis as predicted by some. The new teams started working on June 1 and have hit the road running. We are also addressing concerns by residents about shoddy workmanship from previous contractors. These new workers will be held to very high standards and have all been hired only if they have all the necessary accreditation, which was a loophole previously. We envisage improved service delivery going forward.”
Ward 86 councillor Chantelle Fourie-Shawe said in response to City Power’s move, “I have few words, except that we need to now prepare for the worst. Outages will take days to be resolved, if not longer. I will keep fighting the fight, but I do hope there is a realisation of the seriousness of the situation Johannesburg is in and that no amount of escalations or shouting at officials will change this anytime soon.”
Ward 88 councillor Nicolene Jonker said of the protest, “The residents of Ward 88, with good reason, are tired of the city’s entities. They feel like they are doing their work, as we, as councillors are now turned into quasi call centres and escalation channels. I will take their concerns to the speaker.”
Contact Michael O’Dononvan on 082 925 1774 to learn more about the Ward 88 group.
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