It’s time to go beyond ‘Elastoplast’ solutions to a far greater problem

James Duncan writes:

As an Ekurhuleni resident and ratepayer of more than 40 years, it astounds me that our municipality is still in what I call ‘Elastoplast’ mode when it comes to dealing with infrastructure issues.

These issues are mainly arising from what can be described, at best, as gross mismanagement over more than two decades.
When something like a loud bang in the middle of the night occurs and the power goes off, we don’t need councillors to tell us the obvious via WhatsApp.

After years of experience, most Ekurhuleni ratepayers can pretty much guess the likely causes. And most of us know what to do.
What we need to hear from our councillors and from the people we pay to manage our municipality is: what is being done in the medium and long-term solutions to address the myriad of serious problems we have in our area?

What practically, for example, is being done to stop thieves and vandals from interfering with basic power infrastructure? We don’t need ingenuity.
There’s something out there generally referred to as ‘international best practice’. Is this even looked at and considered?

It’s naïve for the council, and Lord alone knows how many paid advisers waste time producing tomes called Integrated Development Plans and expect most ratepayers to apply their minds, read, attend meetings and give considered feedback; most of us are out here trying to earn a living.

Also Read: LETTER: We keep paying for poor service