Less than a month before the repairs to the intersection at Voortrekker and Viljoen streets are supposed to be completed, workers and contractors are clashing over money.

Workers were seen picketing on Tuesday morning, demanding payment.

The labourers were standing in full view of motorists at the crossing, carrying placards reading, “Request for payment for work done declared a crime by Groove Master. We want our money.”

According to them, they have never received any payment from the contractor since they started working.

ALSO READ:Repairs at Voortrekker/Viljoen intersections are expected to finish in April

Francis Ngombe, a contract manager who was also picketing, said, “When we started working they explained to us that they have not received payment yet and that they will pay us when they can. We agreed that they will at least provide us with money for transport. However, since last Wednesday we have not received a cent. We just want them to pay us our money for the work we did on-site. Months have passed but still, no payment has been made to us.”
Ngombe said he and three other workers are engineers chosen to supervise the work.

“We are responsible for payment certificates, wage consolidation for labour, monthly reports, safety monitoring, interpreting drawings, machinery hire, material orders, the appointment of sub-contractors and attending all meetings concerning the intersection repair.”

ALSO READ: Lydenburg Hospital fine-tunes its services

Sbusiso Shongwe from Groove Masters dismissed the allegations.”I paid them. They owe me money since they have not done the work I paid them for. I paid them more than R100 000 before they started working on the project.

I paid R25 000 upfront and towards December I gave them another R25 000. Payment for January until now calculates to about R60 000. I doubt any business will pay people R100 000 for transport. It is therefore not true that the money is for transport.”

It is unclear if this setback will affect the planned completion date of the intersection. If all goes according to plan, all repairs should be completed during the first week of April.