Probe into revamp of old-age homes

Metro to investigate shoddy repairwork on four northern areas facilities

POOR workmanship in the revamp of four old age homes in Port Elizabeth’s northern areas will be the subject of an investigation by the Nelson Mandela Bay Municipality. About R4.5-million of the R6.8-million budget for the year has been poured into fixing up the buildings, but councillors complained there had been very few changes and demanded to know why.

The old age homes are Adcock, Elizabeth Stuurman, Bethelsdorp and Allan Hendricks.

The city took back the management of the four facilities last year.

The homes, which are the property of the municipality, had deteriorated into a state of disrepair, with allegations of mismanagement.

The municipality set aside money in its budget to fix the facilities and ensure they were habitable.

But shortly after work started, the municipality discovered that the work was not up to scratch and that the contractor had not been briefed properly.

The company returned in February and is continuing the work.

However, councillors said costs incurred so far could not be justified.

Human settlements political head Nqaba Bhanga said he had reported the matter to mayor Athol Trollip, telling him about his concerns over how the money had been spent.

“We are not happy about what we saw in some of the homes. The Adcock Home is beautiful and we want all the homes to look like that,” Bhanga said.

“I have informed the mayor about my concerns that I am not convinced by the work we have seen and the money spent.

“We will go as a committee with the mayor to do another oversight visit. If there are irregularities, it must be clear.

“We are not going to allow wasteful expenditure. That is why we have asked for a full report to give us details on how the money was spent.”

However, DA councillor Trevor Louw said he was not impressed even by the renovation work done at the Adcock Home.

“We found the contractor just put up gutters for us to see and people were still complaining,” he said.

“For example, there are doors that don’t lock. You need to look at what is urgent and fix that. There are women in that place – if they can’t lock a door, that is a safety issue.

“Honestly, I am unhappy with the money spent and the kind of work done.”

DA councillor Shaun Soyes said the Bethelsdorp Home was in a worse condition than others.

“I am at the old age home every day and I want the officials to explain how they managed to spend R1.7-million on that home because they are still busy with the bathrooms,” Soyes said.

“I want to know specifically what has been done with that money.”

ANC councillor Sizwe Jodwana said the council agreed to look after all old age homes in the city but only the ones in the northern areas were being revamped.

“I want to know what criteria was used, because there is nothing about Ekuphumleni Old Age Home in this report,” Jodwana said.

Human settlements head Nolwandle Gqiba said only facilities owned by the city were being revamped.