Today the Democratic Alliance Provincial chairman Francois Rodgers is interacting with Ugu District municipality residents affected by the ongoing water outages. This as the municipality is entering the second week of a massive water outage. This follows a long period of continuous water outages affecting KwaZulu Natal South Coast.
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This is the fourth water crisis in 2018 alone, as the municipality has been in crisis since January 2015. The current outages are due to an illegal municipal worker’s strike, subsequent sabotage and toxic relationship between municipal workers and officials.
All the while, the most vulnerable residents of Port Shepstone, Margate, Bhobhoyi, Murchison, KwaXolo and surrounding areas have to bear the brunt of degraded service. The latest crisis has also resulted in numerous schools closing and services at hospitals including Port Shepstone Regional, Murchison and St Andrews have been severely affected as the hospitals were forced to scale down due to unreliable water supplies.
The lack of leadership in the District has prolonged the toxic relationship between municipal workers, officials. This has resulted in continuous strikes and massive infrastructure sabotage.
It is shocking that the Premier and MEC Weziwe Thusi were in the Port Shepstone for Children’s Day celebrations yet they did not address the massive ongoing water crisis.
The Democratic Alliance has also made numerous presentations to MEC of Corporate Governance and Traditional Affairs Nomusa Dube-Ncube for the Ugu District Municipality to be put under Section 139 administration. Until today these have fallen on deaf ears as the MEC continuous to support her comrades despite the suffering of Ugu citizens.
The Democratic Alliance has taken the following steps to assist communities:
- Councillors have been on the ground in communities daily to sourcing water and keeping communities informed.
- The Democratic Alliance has reported the Ugu District Municipality to both the SA Human Rights Commission and Public Protector and investigations are ongoing.
- The Ugu water crisis and Section 139 administration request will be before the NCOP Standing Committee of Local Government today. We are awaiting the outcome of this meeting.
- The Democratic Alliance has submitted a petition to the National Assembly for the bulk water services of the Ugu District Municipality to be transferred to Umgeni Water to manage.
The DA Ugu caucus previously moved a motion to this regard in the Ugu council however the uncaring ANC voted against it. We have also pushed through the call for local disaster area declaration. It is now in the hands of the Premier Mchunu to make the proclamation.
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There is no new dawn for Ugu residents as their suffering continues and uncertainty of the future as tourism business suffers and jobs get lost. We will continue to push for good governance and service delivery to be a reality in Ugu.
Rishigen Viranna MPL – Ugu Constituency Head
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