The Merafong City Local Municipality has still not attended to the problems at the sinkhole across from Hlanganani Primary School in Khutsong.

By Monday, May 18, sewage was still leaking into the sinkhole from a broken pipe that had not yet been replaced by the municipality. A group of angry residents stopped a municipal contractor from closing the sinkhole without fixing the broken pipe last month.

“If they just bury the leak, another sinkhole will just fall in there,” said one of the group, Thabo Klaas.
Although the sinkhole was originally cordoned off, there were no barricades left around it this week. As the hole is more than five metres deep, it is extremely dangerous for primary school learners who walk past the site every day.

The sinkhole first reappeared in February when a manhole collapsed, less than a year after a R6m repair project was supposedly completed.

This follows a previous scandal involving nearly R5m allegedly paid for unfinished work at the same spot, a matter that has been under investigation since October 2024.

To make matters worse, another manhole that is part of the same sewer network has also started sagging next to the tar road leading past the school. By Monday, it was already much lower than last month.

Meanwhile, the ongoing problems with the area’s sewer network, of which the sinking pipes and manholes are a part, are leading to ongoing sewage leaks in the area.

About a kilometre away, the pensioner Agnes Mtshizane and other residents are having a hard time because sewage is streaming from manholes in their yards.

“We are tired of reporting this to the municipality. It has been leaking like this for the past three months,” she complains.

Other residents complained that the leaks in their yards have been continuing for six to eight months and that the issues are affecting their health.

Residents such as Chucku Kerileng have accused the municipality in the past of neglecting the sewage problems so that they can pay contractors to remove the excess leaking sewerage from the broken network in honey-sucker trucks.

Although the Herald asked the municipality’s marketing and communications manager, Temba Fezani, about the problems on Monday, no feedback was received by printing time.