Sewerage kills business in Vereeniging

VEREENIGING.- Frustration has set in for the business owners and ordinary community members in the town of Vereeniging.
This follows the flow of raw sewerage in almost every corner of the once beautiful town. Speaking to Sedibeng Ster the business owners said that soon they will have no option but to close down their business and move to a more viable location for their businesses to can operate. On the other hand community members feel that the Emfuleni Local Municipality (ELM), to which they pay their rates and taxes does nothing to improve the situation. “We have just been left like this and no one comes to explain to us what is happening and for how long we must tolerate this kind of conditions. Our children can’t play outside because of the health hazards. We cannot open our windows, we cannot take walk in our own residential areas, someone must come down here and tell us what is happening, please,” said the residents.
Most notable business have begun taking their stock and moving to other areas. Sedibeng Ster’s sister newspaper Vaal Weekblad reported last week that unlocking the full R1,2 billion budget over three years for the stalled Vaal sewage pollution clean-up project is said to be at an advanced en route stage for National Treasury approval.
Without referring to specific amounts, Department of Water and Sanitation spokesperson, Sputnik Ratau, said that budget approval was “at an advanced stage” for the mammoth multidepartment and co-operative governance project.
“The process is at an advanced stage, awaiting the signature of the Director- General of the Department of Water and Sanitation for submission to the National Treasury,” said Ratau.
It was still unclear whether Ratau was only referring to the R341 million promised by a previous Minister of Water and Sanitation or to the envisaged R1,2 billion budget total referred to by Government when the South African National Defence Force (SANDF) was originally deployed in December 2018.
But reliable sources close to the process said a “first tranche” of possibly R400 million could be released as soon as this week, with other tranches of what remained of the R1,2 billion budget – if approved by Treasury – in due course or as considered necessary.
This follows weeks of intense activity, both politically and by officials, to resolve the growing crisis around the stalled project while sewage pollution reaches record levels in the Vaal region and in the Vaal River system.
Tourism and business confidence in the Vaal region has been ruined by the ongoing crisis, according to business and activists