All fired up…
Funds were set aside to employ and train more firefighters.
FIRE hazards have become a mounting concern in the district, revealed Ugu District Municipality mayor, Ntombifikile Gumede, at a fire and emergency truck handover on Monday.
“Fires have become a huge problem within our six local municipalities especially in Umzumbe municipality,” she added.
“With so many fires occurring in the district we realised that the trucks we had were not enough. Our main aim is to try to make sure that all local municipalities have their own fire trucks,” said the mayor.
Through a grant from the department of Cooperative Governance and Traditional Affairs (Cogta) the municipality was able to purchase four fire and emergency trucks, from Bates Isuzu Trucks, for Umzumbe, Ezinqoleni and Umdoni municipalities.
“We are honoured that Ugu decided to buy the fire trucks from our car dealership,” said Noel Allchin, who is the dealer principal at Bates Delta Port Shepstone.
“We are glad that the municipality saw our trucks fit for this community project. We are looking forward to working with the municipality in the future,” he added
The four trucks were purchased at R306 895.98 each, and an additional R997 728 was spent on adding on tanker units for fighting grass fires, bringing the total to R2 225 266.92.
The district municipality is also providing Ezinqoleni, Umuziwabantu, Umzumbe and Vulamehlo, with funds to employ firefighters. Each of these municipalities received R317 162.50for this purpose.
