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The DA in Mpumalanga has accused Thaba Chweu officials of contempt of court after they allegedly failed to abide by a court ruling to stop sewage spilling into a river since 2011.
Former Thaba Chweu manager Siphiwe Matsi pleaded guilty to all charges pertaining to contraventions of the National Environmental Management Waste Act and the National Water Act.
“The DA,” said the party’s member of the National Council of Provinces, Sonja Boshoff, “had hoped that this would serve as a deterrent to the municipality, but, unfortunately, it is now clear that they are incapable of working towards abiding by the directives of the court order. We can now reveal that the sewer spillages in Thaba Chweu have continued unabated, which is a contravention of the court ruling.”
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Boshoff added that the municipality had also promised to draw up a plan of action by the end of November last year, but it had not been tabled at any council meeting for approval nor have any stakeholders been provided with it.
“The only reference to a plan is when officials respond to queries by stating that they are working on a plan,” she said.
Municipal spokesperson Themba Sibiya said that the municipality had been complying with the court order, but pumps had been failing because of load shedding and causing the sewage spill.
He said:
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A matter of life and death
Thaba Chweu Local Municipality’s technical and engineering services director Sinenhlanhla Manqele laid charges with the police in October last year after he allegedly received death threats when he reported to the Municipal Public Accounts Committee (MPAC) how incompetent and kickback-paying service providers and consultants appointed were only to leave projects, including the water treatment plants, incomplete.
Manqele blew the whistle when it appeared that he was being made a scapegoat for the guilty finding when MPAC started its probe.
Manqele defended himself in a 14-page report to the MPAC by alleging that Matsi had completely sidelined him from participating in the awarding of tenders in his department. This, Manqele said, was done so that unskilled contractors and unregistered consultants could be appointed.
Manqele alleged that some service providers financially overcommitted themselves when they paid kickbacks, and they eventually failed to complete some of the projects, which included water and sanitation, which cost the municipality R10 million.
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He averred that sewage spills had been a problem since he had started working at Thaba Chweu in 2012.
In his report, Manqele wrote:
According to the police, Manqele alleged that he had received death threats via SMS on October 3 at 6pm. The message he received was: “Your days are numbered on earth. You won’t be alive in the next 14 days.”
According to the Green Drop Report released last April, 334 (39%) municipal wastewater systems in the country were identified as being in a critical state of disrepair.
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The report said that Limpopo had 78% of its systems in a critical state, followed by the Northern Cape (76%), North West (69%), the Free State (67%), Mpumalanga (43%), the Eastern Cape (39%), Gauteng (15%), KwaZulu-Natal (14) and the Western Cape (11%).
These systems spilled billions of litres of poorly treated or untreated sewage, as well as industrial and pharmaceutical wastewater, into rivers and oceans every day.
