Trollip to visit family of Colchester fire victims

NELSON Mandela Bay mayor Athol Trollip will today visit the grief-stricken family of an elderly woman and her son who died in a shack fire at the weekend.

Trollip’s chief of staff, Kristoff Adelbert, said the mayor would convey his condolences in person to the relatives of Nonganina Mbengashe, 79, and her son Zwelandile, 46, who died in the early hours of Sunday when their shack in Colchester’s Endlovini informal settlement caught alight, possibly from a primus stove, and burnt down.

Nonganina’s son, Mthuthuzeli Bell, 55, blamed the fire on the government, saying the family had pleaded for 10 years with the municipality and Eskom officials to provide electricity and houses to the community.

Adelbert, however, said yesterday Eskom was entirely responsible for servicing Colchester’s network.

“Those who live in registered informal settlements in the metro – which includes Colchester – receive basic service delivery from the metro, but it excludes electricity,” he said.

“In terms of housing, the metro has an extremely long waiting list and a backlog of 80 000 houses, built up over decades of corruption.

“The coalition government has already put systems in place [to improve housing delivery], but the reality is that the people who are waiting for houses invariably live in these settlements.”

Eskom spokesman in the province Zama Mpondwana said the power utility would consult with the municipality to find a way forward.

The metro’s housing delivery is managed by the Housing Development Agency.