Living with a river of sewage
Streets just pools of sewage due to burst pipe
THE stench hits you immediately. It is both appalling and distressing. And that is if you are just a visitor. But for the residents of Silvertown in Kwazakhele, this is what they have to live with every day.
It is also sickening. Stepping out of their homes and into pools of sewage, they wrinkle up their noses, cough or scratch at skin rashes.
For the past two months, a steady stream of sewage from a burst pipe has run down the roads of an area where toilets do not even exist.
This is human waste flowing in from other parts of the city. In Silvertown, the bucket system is still forced on residents.
In 2013, the Silvertown informal settlement was named the worst place to live in South Africa.
Almost five years later, this does not appear to have changed.
To date, their pleas for help to deal with the sewage leak have been ignored, they say.
Standing amid the waste and stench, despondent residents tell heartbreaking stories of ill-health and children who are prevented from playing outside.
Silvertown’s worst-place-to-live status – accorded the area by low-level geographic data from the Census 2011 – can be believed when standing in the stinking streets looking at people whose faces tell a story of promises made and broken time and again.
They say the human waste that runs like a river through the streets has disrupted their lives.
While talking to a Herald reporter, people covered their noses as the burst pipe continued to bubble over onto the tarred road.
Resident Nosipho Ndinisa, 39, said her little boy’s body was riddled with a rash she believed was a result of playing in fetid water.
She said: “I’m constantly at the clinic because I’m sick and so is my child. I go every two weeks because even though I tell my son not to play outside, I find him playing in that sewage.”
A frustrated Ndinisa said she did not even see the point of voting anymore because “even though we vote, we’re living like animals who live in sh**”.
Nosiseko Mangaliso, 54, who has lived in Silvertown for 28 years, said her entire family was coughing.
Longtime resident Ntombinto Mathiso, 38, said she had stopped opening her windows “because of this”.
She said a contractor who came to fix the problem had reportedly left without having completed the job because of crime.
“From what I hear, the contractor said he was robbed more than three times, both in daylight and late at night and some equipment was stolen,” Mathiso said.
Ward 19 councillor Gamalihleli Maqula said he had been made aware of the problem about two months ago but thought it had been fixed as the municipality was dealing with the problem directly.
“The municipality was trying to find the problem to the continuous blockage there and I was told after the contractors stopped working, the problem would be solved,” Maqula said.
He had not realised the sewage was still running out.
Infrastructure, engineering, electricity and energy political head Masixole Zinto said he would follow up on the issue to make sure there was a lasting solution.
“Issues of sanitation are issues of dignity – we cannot allow our people to live in such conditions. A team will be sent [to Silvertown],” Zinto said.
He said they would be escorted and the municipality would conduct an awareness programme in the area, asking the community to work with the municipality to protect municipal staff.
Zinto said the community would be asked to report crime incidents “so that the criminals can be rooted out of our communities”.