Last-ditch bid to draw DA’s attention to Charlesville’s plight

OPEN letter to Mmusi Maimane

Given the fact that you completed your high school education at a privileged school, you should be familiar with the expression “People living in glass houses should not throw stones.”

As a politician, you use the media to great effect to lay into provinces and municipalities not under your party’s control; more often than not pointing an accusing finger at your opposition for their failure to deliver basic services to long-suffering residents. Of course, you are correct to do this, and it is expected of you, given your position.

The fault line in your argument, however, is your obvious overlooking of what happens right under your nose in the city that proudly boasts the payoff line “Making progress possible. Together” and the province with the pay-off line “Better together”.

You are the de facto political head of both these tiers of government in the Western Cape and, sad to say, those stones that you throw so regularly will increasingly start boomeranging and hit right back at you in your glass house if you do not start looking critically around you.

As residents of a small suburb called Charlesville (like your officials, you will very likely not know where it is), we boldly state that both the city and the province that you govern pay lip service to service delivery.

Allow us as residents of Charlesville to illustrate this point. More than four months ago (yes, sir, before the local government elections), residents had been trying to get the city to collect rubbish in a children’s play park. The rubbish is still there to this day.

Others have attempted to get the city for the same period of time to cut the wild-growing grass in what are supposed to be children’s play parks. As recently as eight days ago, another resident wrote to a host of city politicians and officials with the same complaint. We are aware that there was a flurry of responses to this recent correspondence, but to this day, the rubbish is still there and the grass remains uncut.

The newly elected councillor for the area visited one of the affected parks more than two weeks ago and confirmed in writing that he would report the matter. Still nothing has happened. Pity the poor councillor!

Obviously, no one in the city and the province takes him seriously.

Not enough to convince you? Then let us point out to you that going right back to 2010, numerous efforts have been made to get the city and the province to regularly clean the last remaining open stretch of land in Charlesville, with adjoining erfs owned by the city and province, respectively.

We have begged the province to give us the land for use as a community recreation facility as we don’t have any facilities in Charlesville and the adjoining suburbs of Montana and Montevideo. Our pleas have fallen on deaf ears for seven years, and all our requests for engagement with the city and the province on the use of the property referred to have been ignored.

We are not trying to embarrass you by writing this open letter to you. We have tried so many avenues and have failed. Regard this as a last-ditch attempt to get some municipal and provincial services in Charlesville.

We are sure that while at school you also heard the expression “First clean your own backyard”, and with a bit of poetic licence, we add “before looking over the fence into your neighbour’s backyard”.