Ehmke street park-a troubled landscape

Two weeks ago Nelspruit Post reported on the improved condition of the Ehmke Street park. The cleanliness of the park was restored after members of ACS Security, Bossies Community Justice, the Nelspruit Concerned Citizens group and staff of Village SPAR embarked on a joint clean-up effort.

A reliable eyewitness reported seeing groups of people drinking in the park almost every day:

“People use the park as an open ‘pub’.”

Nelspruit Post visited the park on Saturday night. No one was drinking at the time, but there was an increased amount of alcoholic beverage bottles scattered throughout the vicinity.

According to the eyewitness, some of the people who drink in the park buy the alcohol from  TOPS at SPAR. “I have seen a few of them enter TOPS with glasses in hand,” he claimed.

In a statement issued by senior retail operations manager at Village SPAR, it was confirmed that this has happened. However, the establishment made it explicitly clear that it does not condone this sort of behaviour and that these people had been escorted out by its security services every time such an incident occurred. It also indicated that the park was becoming a persistent problem.

Col Mtsholi Bhembe of the SAPS said:

“Officially it is a problem of the City of Mbombela Local Municipality (CMLM), especially the illegal dumping. That said, should CMLM be having a problem with the state of any public place, they can always call the police to assist them. To my knowledge, no report was made on the state of the park next to the Village shopping centre. Drinking in public places is illegal, and when it is reported, we as the police act on these incidents.”

At the time of publication, CMLM was not available for comment.