Down but not out: petition against trucking continues

COMMUNITIES surrounding the Durban Harbour have been dealt another blow during the October 2019 sitting of the eThekwini council. Councillors from Bluff, Clairwood, Umbilo, Austerville, Merebank, Merewent, Seaview, Bellair, Rossburg and Montclair (ward 32, 33, 64, 65, 66 and 68) have been inundated with complaints from residents about the increasing presence of logistic trucks along restricted residential roads.

This is according to ward 66 councillor JP Prinsloo who shared that the issue is mainly attributed to inefficiencies and the ineffective operating of the Durban Harbour resulting in logistic trucks skipping long queues entering into the harbour and instead utilising residential roads to meet their shipping deadlines.

“As the public representatives of these communities we came together a formulated a strategy to hold the city, the province and national government accountable to the dire state of the harbour and the effect it has on the surrounding communities. To date, we have obtained more than 4000 signatures demanding that the city deals with this pressing issue, various letters have also been written to the KZN MEC for Economic Development and Environmental Affairs as well as to the Head of Department (HOD) of KZN Transport. Four official questions and a motion were submitted to the eThekwini council to act decisively on any illegal activity around the Durban Harbour.”

The questions submitted to council by each of the councillors specifically related to:

• The city’s strategy in dealing with the pressures placed on the current road infrastructure surrounding the port.
• The amount of funding allocated by the city in increasing the capacity of current road infrastructure surrounding the harbour.
• Amount of resources currently allocated by the KZN traffic department to assist Metro police in prosecuting road traffic violations surrounding the harbour and whether more provincial traffic policing be allocated to assist Metro police.
• Construction of additional logistics staging areas for logistic trucks and companies alleviate the pressures around the port.
• The current capacity of the Clairwood Metro police trucking unit and the additional resources they require.
• Finalisation of the city’s long awaited heavy duty tow trucking contract
• Road fatality numbers, fines issued and the number of unroadworthy trucks removed from public roads surrounding the harbour.

“To our surprise only 10 per cent of these questions where formally answered in council by the governing party in the council meeting, despite them being required to by law. Attempts were made to meet with and obtain the support of the mayor before the council sitting but to no one’s surprise no meeting was ever confirmed by the mayor’s office. The Speaker of Council rejected the motion on the basis that the facts presented to council were deemed as ‘disparaging or made improper suggestions’ which is a complete farce and a method to sidestep the issue,” said Prinsloo.

Prinsloo said that they would not be discouraged in their efforts to address this situation and plan to resubmit all the unanswered questions and the rejected motion at the next full council meeting. “We will also be writing to the various national ministers responsible for the Durban Harbour and the infrastructure surrounding the port to provide us with immediate solutions to the illegal usage.

Residents still have the opportunity to support the fight by signing the trucking petition available on the Bluff Community Noticeboard, Ethekwini Ward 64, Ward 65 Ethekwini, Cllr Sharmaine Sewshanker, Cllr Mmabatho Tembe and Cllr Aubrey Snyman Facebook pages.

Hard copies of the petition can also be emailed to residents that do not have access to Facebook. Email bluffservicedelivery@gmail.com for a hard copy.