Mogale admits to serious problem

The Mogale City Local Municipality finally explained the cause of the persistent water problem after residents of some of Krugersdorp’s affluent suburbs gathered at Town Hall for an urgent meeting.

Fed-up, dirty and thirsty residents arrived at Town Hall on 20 November only to be greeted by Mogale’s Mayor Councillor Koketso Calvin Seerane on his way out to the opening of Cradlestone Mall.

As the residents were furious and demanding answers, the Mayor asked some of his executive committee members to address the residents. The municipal spokesperson Nkosana Zali together with the municipality’s financial officer Farouk Bhayat and an engineer who currently is working on the upgrade of the Kenmare Reservoir, Sandile Mbanjwa, convened with the residents.

Gert Jonker, founder of The Bethany House Trust, was also among the residents. Currently the babies in Jonker’s care are suffering from diarrhea since they were instructed to use swimming pool water as part of their sanitary purposes.

The meeting had started off with Mogale’s Head of Infrastructure Dennis Mokatedi admitting to the lack of proper communication from their side.

Secondly it was explained that since the start of the reservoir upgrade, a serious problem occurred as water meant to be pumped to the reservoir is lost along the way.

The panel explained that a huge amount of water is lost between the feed from Rand Water and the reservoir. Somewhere water is seeping out of the ground, and they do not know where that is.

“A team of technicians camped at the reservoir to do all the necessary work and seal leaking joints in the reservoir (which is essentially a water-storage facility) as well as alternative provision of water to households through a bypass. Whilst work was being done, the municipality had tankered water trucks in various delivery points as a contingency plan for residents in affected areas. As in the nature of such work, there was a minor setback that disrupted supply this morning but was fixed,” said Zali in a press statement.

Even though most of the water flow has been restored to the affected suburbs, it is not clear if Mogale City sorted out their water loss problems.

Extreme measures have been put in place. Some suburbs will experience water disruptions while other suburbs use the opportunity to stock up.

During the meeting the officials promised to inform the ward councillors of the suburbs of the latest information regarding the problem. They will release information to the councillors at around 3pm everyday in order for the councillors to convey the message over to the residents.

Many argued that Mogale City should not bill its residents for the duration of the disruption.

However, Winston Markram of Monument informed the NEWS that he noticed his water meter indicates that his water consumption is still running.

“The thing is it’s not measuring water consumption but air. This air comes through the pipes, which normally is an indication that water is on the way … but even the water didn’t arrive … just air,” said Markram.

For now, residents are happy to have water again, but still wonder how long it will last and if the council will find the problem and solve is soon.