Is there hope for Vryheid’s constant water issues?

Ward Councillor Magda Viktor, PR Councillor Swelakhe Shelembe and Nathi Mbongwa (director of Technical Services) carried out an oversight visit regarding the water issues at Klipfontein Dam on Monday afternoon. It was a successful visit, since Cllr Viktor managed to point out a few issues to the director. Cllr Viktor says, “Some of the previous issues have been sorted out since my last visit, which points in a positive direction. I have visited the site three times in the last three weeks, and a few things have changed for the better. The previously unoccupied security house at the entrance is under construction at the moment. When we visited the site where the cable was stolen previously, it was closed with some kind of Masonite plate, with a rock on top of it, during my last visit. This gave easy access to anyone to steal those cables once again. But now there is improvement; they have been working on that, even though it is still not fixed properly. I have made Nathi attend to these errors and problems, and he promised to attend to this issue since those cables are in danger of being stolen once again. They are planning to build a security box over those open cables to protect them from being stolen.”

“The water pipe at Klipfontein Dam, which is visible from the R33 towards Ulundi, sometimes leaks due to the pressure of the water. I get numerous calls regarding the ‘leaking pipe’ and Nathi has promised that this will be fixed in the future. However, this will take a few days to fix, which will leave the town without water once again. That ‘leak’ is currently covered with a tarp to prevent it from spraying.”

“Water was spraying from another pipe, which was quite upsetting. This is a burst waiting to happen and then the town would be without water again. When I showed this to Nathi, he admitted that it doesn’t look good and he couldn’t understand why nothing has been done about it. While we were standing there, Nathi made a phone call to Eworks to have it fixed the following day. I told him I would check the following day to see if the problem was being fixed.“

“In short, there is a definite positive movement and it was a comfortable oversight visit between the three of us. I really hope that something positive comes from this visit. Stephan Landman, who has been appointed as the acting municipal manager as of Friday afternoon, passed us by on his way home and pointed out some other problems as well. He seemed to be impressed with all the relevant parties who attended the oversight visit.”

“On our way to Noord Street, we stopped at a terrible leak in Deputasie Street where the water bubbles up from the ground. There is a huge trench left as is – a half-done job. We passed the leak in Noord Street, which is a huge problem, and we showed it to Nathi and Khanyile (manager of the Water Department) again. I have reported that leak numerous times before and got it fixed. Unfortunately, it is leaking again. At that specific place, litres and litres of water just gets wasted.”

The party visited a few other water leaks in town as well, of which all had a positive outcome, since promises were made that these leaks would be fixed immediately. Both Cllr Viktor and Cllr Shelembe hope and believe that there will soon be ‘a better outcome and change’ for the issues in town.

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