Skhila threatens to protest against TCM
After several attempts to get the attention of the Thaba Chweu Municipality (TCM), the Skhila Concerned Group (SCG), now threatens to heat things up with violent protests if it doesn’t respond soon, the SCG’s chairman, Mr Mandla Mothlala, warned.
SKHILA – After several attempts to get the attention of the Thaba Chweu Municipality (TCM), the Skhila Concerned Group (SCG), now threatens to heat things up with violent protests if it doesn’t respond soon, the SCG’s chairman, Mr Mandla Mothlala, warned.
“It has became a tradition for TCM to ignore issues and therefore we urge them to please listen to us before things get violent. We want to avoid it at all cost but the time has come for them to listen,” Mothlala said.
The SCG recently started occupying land between Skhila village and Skhila Secondary School by marking out new stands with the aim to expand Skhila to about 2 500 to 3 000 households in order to qualify for a budget.
“We have a serious problem with service delivery and since 2001 nothing has been done to address our daily problems. Time after time TCM uses the excuse that Skhila is too small to qualify for services,” the deputy chairperson, Mr Promise Mmekwa of the SCG said.
According to Mothlala the mayor, Mr Michael Ncongwane, arrived on the site on Friday, wearing a dust mask. “It was the first time I have seen Ncongwane in Skhila since last year’s IDP’s meeting, of which nothing has come anyway.” “We live in these conditions every day and arriving with a dust mask left us speechless. We can’t live like this,” members of the community said.
According to Mmekwa TCM threatened the committee and residents they would bring in the police and even “shoot them” if they continue to occupy land.
“We are not afraid. We are prepared to fight and we will have no choice but to turn violent,” Mothlala said.
According to him they have tried to communicate with TCM several times but it seems as if the speaker’s and mayor’s offices are not communicating with each other at all.
Mothlala said the mayor advised them upon his visit to direct their issues to the speaker, which they had done but to no avail. The committee then requested the ward councillor, Mr Farhad Essack, for his assistance in resolving Ward 14’s issues, but still nothing has been done according to Mothlala.
In a letter addressed to the speaker, Essack acknowledged the fact that no action was taken at Skhila.
“It is a fact that for a long time now TCM has ignored the residents of Skhila and has failed to implement or invest its budget or IDP programme in this part of our town,” he said.
Essack requested a reply to the letter within seven days, but Mothlala confirmed that no reply had been received.
“This time we are not playing and if our problems don’t get serious consideration bad things will happen,” Mothlala said.
He also confirmed that a march is being planned for next week Wednesday in which a memorandum of demands will be submitted to TCM.
“We have tried to communicate with TCM and we even invited them to an interview on Mash FM, the local radio station, but no one of TCM pitched”, Mothlala said.
“With this march we hope TCM realises how serious we are and we really hope to resolve the issues peacefully,” Mothlala continued. He warned that if TCM still refused to address their memorandum issues, they would close the R37 and even boycott the votes in the coming election. TCM’s only response was it would not tolerate any form of illegal squatting.
