Sol Plaatje municipality’s ongoing failure to provide adequate sanitation services to residents of Carters Glen creates a toxic legacy of pollution and environmental harms.
The carcass of the Carters Glen pump station, robbed of its permanent pump by vandals years ago, requires near daily emptying by mobile teams. The municipality only attends to overflows every five to seven days, leaving residents to bear the brunt of sewage overflowing into their gardens, running down their driveways, blocking their toilets, and denying them the full use of their lawful properties. Recently, the municipality was unable to resolve severe sewage overflows on the grounds of the Bakenskop Church at the corner of Rhodes Avenue and Drakensberg Avenue and nearby homes for two weeks.
I visit the pump station and speak with relevant officials almost daily about the problem, but it seems as if the municipality is unable to fix it. As ward councillor, I held a fruitful community meeting yesterday with residents. The outcome of the meeting included that residents are willing to pay for the procurement, installation and monitoring of a floodlight and security cameras at the pump station if the municipality agrees to install a permanent pump on site.
I will be submitting this proposal, as well as a petition on behalf of the community for the municipality to meet their obligations and resolve the sanitation issues in the short term, as a matter of urgency. We are considering other avenues to compel the municipality to meet its legal obligations to residents.
A lack of maintenance, poor project management, and mismanagement of dwindling financial resources without oversight from relevant municipal committees created this situation, which violates the environmental and constitutional rights of residents. Promises of a new sewage line and pump station, a project plagued by delays and cost overruns since 2018, is simply not enough.
Residents deserve to have their constitutional rights protected, not violated by a negligent municipality.