‘Year of failure for ward 66’

IF the municipality were to receive a report card in terms of service delivery for ward 66, ward councillor, Duncan Du Bois, believes they would not be graduating this year.

He notes six areas of failure as the reasons behind the bad scorecard: Derelict buildings in Fynnlands, the beach upgrade proposal, the Donnelly Road housing project, Bushland Road vacant land, the failure of the War Room and shoddy workmanship.

“Ivor Aylward (former Bluff Ratepayers Assocation chairman) has been unrelenting in requesting the demolition of the derelict buildings which house people under appalling conditions in Ivernia Road and Bluff Road, opposite the Fynnlands station. Not only are these structures eyesores but they flout every health and safety regulation.”

Du Bois and Aylward are also disappointed in the beach upgrade proposal. “In October 2013, we were promised a report back on the public input in February. It did not happen. Only in mid-November was that report made available. While it has positive aspects, it also reflects more on what the architects want the Bluff people to have, rather than the other way around. There is also a dark silence about how much the upgrade will cost and just when in our lifetimes it will come to pass,” said Du Bois.

“In my opinion the proposal put forward to the public was not in any way professional. There was no indication of budget. This upgrade is supposed to benefit the entire South Durban Basin. To me the proposal divides the beaches up into pockets, keeping people apart in their own groups.

What happened to all the input the public came up with at the public meeting last year? It seems as if the public’s ideas and input was never considered,” said Aylward.

The Donnelly Road housing project upgrade, which was scheduled to commence in August, has yet to start. “I am unable to obtain any insight as to when it will get underway. Hundreds of people who live in shocking conditions at that place have been deceived by the slogan ‘moving South Africa forward.’ Instead, they have been required to continue to pay to live in squalor,” said Du Bois.

Numerous requests by the councillor for the vacant lot on Bushland Road to be sold off for development have gone unanswered. The site attracts illegal dumpers and other nefarious characters. “If ever there was an example of the paralysis which characterises what passes for government in this country, that plot exemplifies it. One would think that disposing of the responsibility for maintaining it and generating rates from it would be sensible and logical, but apparently it’s not.”

The War Room, which was an initiative by the provincial premier’s office to improve service delivery, was another failure, with little or no assistance from officials. “From the outset, meetings were poorly attended. Junior officials were sent, who were unable to provide answers or commitments. By the latter part of the year, the War Room had ceased to exist due to a lack of quorum at meetings. Like so many other grandiose ideas, it has amounted to nothing more than spin-doctoring,” said Du Bois.

The councillor rounds up the list of failures with the slapdash workmanship on Solomon Mahlangu Drive, recurring water pipe bursts, failure to remove old tar from verges, poor maintenance of servitudes and patchy collection of orange litter bags.

“2014 has been a year of serial failure, in terms of service delivery in ward 66, which amounts to a report card for 2014 that merits a double F,” said Du Bois.