Govan Mbeki Municipality (GMM) is suing HWIBIDU security company for an estimated R5m for vandalism that occurred at the eMbalenhle water treatment plant last year.
The municipality wants the company to take responsibility for damages and theft of plant equipment.
The Executive Mayor, Nhlakanipho Zuma, visited the plant last year and found that cables, breakers and valves had been stolen.
The municipality previously opened a case of cable theft at the eMbalenhle Police Station in June last year after electricity supply cables at the wastewater treatment works in eMbalenhle had been stolen. This had a dire impact because all pump stations stopped working.
The municipality spent about R60m to upgrade the eMbalenhle Water Treatment Works in the past eight years, but some residents claim they do not know where the supposed upgrading took place because sewage spills had worsened.
The acting communications head for the municipality, Lucky Mhlongo, confirmed that the municipality had served HWIBIDU with a court summons.
“We appointed HWIBIDU Security to safeguard our water treatment plant’s infrastructure in eMbalenhle but they failed to honour their obligation as per the contractual agreement,” he claimed.
“Copper cables were stolen in their presence and the community suffered sewer spills because of the non-functioning of our plant.
“Sewage was unable to reach the water treatment works because of theft and vandalism on their watch.”
Walter Rashidi, a director at HWIBIDU, was aware of the summons but said he would not comment until the matter had been resolved amicably or settled in court.
Rashidi said his company was requesting the municipality to pay the money that was due to them and to honour their service agreement so that they could pay bonuses to their employees.
