Tshwane metro repairs water meter after months, ignores sinkhole
Tshwane metro recently repaired a leaking water meter, but ignored the sinkhole caused by months of leaking water.
After months of struggling with a leaking water meter, residents in Pretoria North were relieved when Tshwane metro showed up last week Thursday to replace the water meter.
However, a large sinkhole, roughly one meter in width and one and a half meter deep, caused by months of leaking water, were left unattended by the metro.
According to Antoinett Barkhuizen, she became aware of the leaking water meter in January and reported it to Tshwane numerous times, without success.
“Because it took them two months to come out and replace the meter, so much water had been leaking into the ground that a dangerous sinkhole formed right next to the house,” Barkhuizen said. “We are relieved that the water meter has been replaced, but they did not even bother to fill up the sinkhole, so we had to fill it up ourselves.”
Barkhuizen, who has been living on the property her entire life, said in the last thirty years, she has never experienced any problems that took this long to be addressed. She said Pretoria has been plagued with water troubles since the end of last year. Old pipes across the city has been bursting and several people have complained about leaking water meters.
Rekord reported earlier on a recent media statement by DA Councillor Bruce Lee, where he highlighted Tshwane metro’s lack of adequate resources.
“The water infrastructure maintenance store in region 2 is run by a single lady with no computer equipment or network access. Everything is recorded by hand and if a job requires spare parts, she has to physically hold them in her hand to reserve them,” Lee wrote.
“The department of water has been pleading with The City of Tshwane’s IT department to install computer equipment and provide network access for the past two years but it is met with silly responses like there are currently no IT tenders issued. This is the reason why a burst water pipe can sometimes take days before it is repaired.”
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