The ANC led Tshwane Council has once more come under fire for poor service delivery in the Laudium area.
Despite the Council urging residents to use water sparingly and undertaking to give priority in attending to water leaks, residents have still been complaining to the Laudium Sun about the poor turn-around time by the Council in attending to water leaks, even when water is gushing out, causing huge wastage.
This follows a resident of 15th Ave, in Laudium being petrified, after discovering yesterday (Thursday, 8) her front yard flooding with water caused by a faulty water meter. Sumaya Goolam together with her husband Faizal told the Laudium Sun that she was shocked to find her yard full of water and after discovering that it was a leak from the water meter, she immediately called the Council for assistance, but they did not respond. She said that she panicked as the water continued to gush out resulting in a stream of water wasting, just flowing down her street. Thereafter Sumaya called for assistance from the Councillor and even his Ward Committee members or anyone else who could assist, by posting her plight together with a video showing the strong water flow gushing out of the leaking pipe, on some of the community based social media platforms.
Sumaya explained further, “At around 2:30pm, the water meter pipe burst in front of my residence on 15th Avenue, Laudium. The Council workers were nowhere to be found, despite the incident being reported at the same time I noticed the pipe burst. A few hours later still no one has come to fix the pipe and I am panicking, as so much water is being wasted and the place is being flooded as a lot of water is gushing out. The water is also entering my house, and it’s also running into the neighbour’s property. I cannot understand why the Council is not attending to this water leak urgently. This is really poor service from the Council — we cannot afford to waste this much water, especially when it’s clean drinking water. Our community is already facing water shortages, so how can we allow such waste? I really hope the Council sends someone to fix the problem very soon, as the area is flooding and an enormous amount of water is being wasted.”
Laudium Sun that service levels are falling
each day, yet Municipal charges are increasing all the time.
The Laudium Sun reporter visited the scene of the water leak a few hours later, towards the evening and water was still gushing out. A seemingly frustrated Sumaya then said, “I just spoke to someone at the Council and they said I should be patient as they have another 84 water leak complaints to attend to, before attending to my complaint. They could not tell me how long it would take before they sent someone out to our place, but said it could take hours or even days. This is really frustrating. How can we as residents be treated so badly by the Council especially in such emergencies? It is really ridiculous. Service levels are falling each day, yet our Municipal charges are increasing all the time.”
15th Avenue resident, Hassen Ebrahim, told the Laudium Sun, “There is a flood-like situation here. The water meter pipe burst a while ago, and our neighbor reported the matter to the Council immediately. We hope the council comes to fix the problem urgently. A lot of water is being wasted and many people don’t even have access to clean water. We are fortunate to have water here — it shouldn’t be wasted like this. This is an unprecedented incident. I understand that the Council workers are busy, but they need to attend to this problem without delay and fix it.”
Sadiq Moosa, another 15th Avenue resident, told the Laudium Sun, “The water pipe burst a few hours ago and this is terrible. The situation on our street is very bad — it’s flooding into many houses. The Council must come and fix the burst pipe so that the water wastage can be stopped.”