Beachfront property owner campaigns against car washers

Residents living on the East London beachfront have accused Buffalo City Metro of “not caring” about the presence of illegal car wash operators who allegedly dump rubbish and use municipal water.

BCM, on the other hand, insists it is clamping down hard.

Property owner and member of the Kennaway Court council Satish Nair spoke to the Dispatch on behalf of residents at the 64-unit complex.

Nair said the beachfront had become filthy, but the most concerning aspect was “illegal” use of municipal water, which affected everyone in the area.

The Dispatch reported in February that beachfront penthouse owners prevented a shack from being built on the Esplanade.

Now car wash owners have residents in a froth.

“When these car washers started operating about a year ago, they were only washing next to the Wimpy. Now they’ve found other sources of water along the Esplanade. They’ve occupied most of the car parks along the beachfront,” Nair said.

“When they wash cars they throw the rubbish from the cars onto the pavement. The rubbish then blocks the drains. Elderly people who live in the units walk and jog on the same pavement. Sometimes you find broken bottles while you’re walking.

“Water is the most concerning issue here, because we have struggled to get rain for months now. We as ratepayers will be charged more if BCM continues to lose this water. We already pay heavily when we misuse water in our units.”

BCM spokesperson Samkelo

Ngwenya said they were aware of the problem and had been taking action.

“This area is one of our operational focus areas. As a result, the safety and security cluster reported at the command council in the last week that law enforcement officers confiscated buckets from the car washers on the Esplanade and 15 car washers were removed from the area,” he said.

“Two vagrants were found sleeping in the bushes at Seaview Terrace and were also asked to leave the area and 190 people were stopped and searched,” said Ngwenya.

According to Nair most of the owners and tenants at Kennaway had been living there for more than 20 years and some units were rented out to foreigners.

“Some people there are top engineers from Mercedes-Benz Germany and Brazil. They are working here on the new model coming out next, but they have to stay on a dirty beachfront.”

Nair said most of the car washers lived in the bush above Heroes Park and near the monuments to the 1820 and German settlers.

He said BCM mayor Xola Pakati was failing them as ratepayers in the metro.

“Tourists go to these places. We’ve been reporting this to the BCM metro police and they do come down to remove these guys. But we feel let down by the mayor because I’ve written two letters to him now, and he’s never responded.

“We don’t know what to do now. I get complaints almost daily from my tenants.”

Ngwenya encouraged residents to continue to contact to BCM or the police. He said the municipality would continue to enforce the metro’s bylaws.