Durban - ActionSA is taking its fight to make Durban’s streets clean again to the Durban High Court.
ActionSA KwaZulu-Natal chairperson Zwakele Mncwango, said it will issue papers to the court to compel the eThekwini Municipality, relevant Cabinet ministers and authorities to address the ongoing sewage crisis facing the city.
The municipality has been hit with a massive sewage crisis following the April and May floods. Mncwango said at the time President Cyril Ramaphosa had pledged R1 billion for repairs, while Co-operative Governance and Traditional Affairs Minister Dr Nkosazana Dlamini Zuma had declared a national state of disaster. However, months later the resources to repair Durban’s sewerage network have not materialised.
“This has resulted in, inter alia, sewage running unabated through people’s homes, in communities that are already exceptionally vulnerable in KZN and contaminating the previously pristine beaches with untreated effluent,” Mncwango said.
He said following a letter of demand and public outcry, as evidenced in ActionSA’s public participation process, the relevant authorities had failed to give effect to their mandate and had simply ignored the crisis.
“ActionSA is confident that judicial oversight will force the executive to act. To this end, ActionSA is bringing court proceedings against, inter alia, the CoGTA minister, the Minister of Water and Sanitation Senzo Mnchunu, Minister of Environment, Forestry and Fisheries Barbara Creecy, Minister of Tourism Lindiwe Sisulu, eThekwini Municipality and others, to fix this cesspit that they have allowed develop,” Mncwango said.
The DA has also established a task team to get the eThekwini Municipality to address the ongoing sewage crisis. This team will be taking this crisis up not only with the municipality, but also the provincial and national governments, to highlight the impact of this disaster and offer workable solutions.
In recent weeks, IOL has extensively covered the city’s sewage crisis which has left residents frustrated and many beaches closed.
Last month, eThekwini Municipality manager Musa Mbhele said the city’s leadership had a plan to upgrade the network. Mbhele said the city needed long-term interventions and an overhaul of the entire network. He said the budget allocated to deal with water treatment challenges wasn’t sufficient and there was a need to look at innovative ways to get more money.
IOL