Bronkhorstspruit residents shutdown municipality

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Protesting residents of Enkangala near Bronkhorstspruit, east of Pretoria, have shut the local municipality over water shortages in the area.

They gathered early Monday and have since been sleeping in the municipality offices to accelerate water delivery in the area. Some residents say children have been missing school due to a lack of water.

Local resident Mboniseni Dlamini says poor water supply has occurred for the past year. Over the past six months, the situation has worsened. Dlamini says as a community leader he went to the water treatment plant in Ekungwini Municipality to assess the situation.

“We did not know what was happening until now but we suspect that there is a lack of commitment on the procurement side whereby the people who are supposed to pay the funds towards the service providers don’t take that responsibility.”

Residents of most affected areas including Enkangala and Rethabiseng voiced concerns over the unstable water supply

“We think that they are just using us, they need an invoice using our grandmothers and our kids to get the votes. And we are not going to vote if this issue still continues.”

“We came here because of water. At Rethabiseng we have three years not having water, we are unable to bath or even go to the toilets because the toilets are not smelling so nice. We can’t even wash our blankets because we don’t have water to wash them. That is why we chose to come and sleep here at the bush because the municipality does not want or care about us.”

Meanwhile the City of Tshwane says they are working around the clock to fast track water restoration to Bronkhorstspruit and surrounding areas following the breakdown of a pump at the water treatment plant.

Tshwane spokesperson Selby Bokaba says, “In our quest to ensure water supply to the residents amid the challenges, the City is continuing with the manipulation of the reservoirs to create a balance in the distribution of water, as an interim measure, however, this intervention has posed a challenge for high lying areas, due to the shortage of pumps.”

The City says it is anticipating that the water flow will significantly improve from next Wednesday.