Killarney residents roll up their sleeves and fill refuse bags with waste from Houghton Drive
Killarney clean-up volunteers refuse to sit back and watch their suburb turn to ruins.
Committed to active citizenry and service, Killarney residents took it upon themselves to clean up and remove rubble from the pavement along Houghton Drive on July 11.
Volunteers went as far as cleaning the bridge, which was filled with makeshift tents and shacks which house homeless people.
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Bradley Kirton, a volunteer, explained that his journey of cleaning up began a few years ago. “I saw Nadia planting different plants on the side of the road in the area and volunteered from then. As a volunteer, I’ve seen a difference we made, although it requires funds which we try to raise.”
He added that the only time he has seen the municipality clean was when the G20 was hosted in the country.
Syringes, cardboard, and rubble were among the items that volunteers filled their refuse plastic bags with.
Nadia Nikakhtar, another volunteer who began the initiative, said it began after she noticed the decline in the municipal’s upkeep in the area.
“We started seeing the absence of the municipal services before the Covid-19 pandemic. During Covid-19, when a lot of things shut down and only essential services worked, the breakdown of the upkeep accelerated.”
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Nikakhtar added that decline in the area was evident in streetlights not being repaired, storm water drains not being cleaned, dustbins not being collected routinely, and loadshedding and outages occurring frequently.
The volunteer added that although there weren’t always a lot of volunteers on the ground, she understood because they paid a lot of rates and taxes that were supposed to be evident in the area’s upkeep. “As a citizen, I stepped up because as part of my grandmother’s death anniversary, I come from a family and faith system that believes in service.
That’s when I set out to raise a call for volunteers, in June 2023, for a clean-up which was when it started.”
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