Acting DSW boss has clean-up ‘in the bag’
NEWLY appointed acting head of Durban Solid Waste (DSW) promises to be like a new broom – not just cleansing the city but also sweeping clean the department of corruption.
Noluthando Magewu has taken on the leading role after DSW head Raymond Rampersad took three months leave from last month.
The unit has been in a mess with workers downing tools and officials being implicated in alleged tender irregularities. There has been a consistent public outcry about a dirty Durban.
The situation has recently seen several church-based organisations get down and dirty to clean up the city.
Magewu has acknowledged that there was a big mess to clean up. “We have been experiencing and we still do experience problems in terms of the standard of service we deliver and the biggest challenge is to standardise the operations and stabilise them,” said Magewu.
Her promise to sweep clean the department comes amid Hawks commercial branch investigations into an allegedly irregular awarding of the orange bag (recyling bags) tender.
Magewu said she was not privy to investigations into the orange bag tender scandal but agreed that corruption needed to be dealt with.
Although she is only in the pos ition temporarily, she is confident that her presence will be felt.
She was committed to ensuring a cleaner city and has even personally retrieved unused refuse bags in the Durban CBD.
Before she was appointed, Magewu was an executive support official for Philemon Mashoko, the city’s trading services cluster deputy city manage. The trading services portfolio is responsible for a number of units including the DSW.
Magewu is a development practitioner and with experience in town planning and infrastructure development.
She previously worked for the Kwazulu-natal Department of Cooperative Governance before joining the city in June last year.
She was among the team which created the turnaround strategy for the Durban CBD.
Magewu said cleaning up the city was linked to the city’s regeneration plan.
Getting this right required a major overhaul to acquire people with skills amid the Fourth Industrial Revolution.
“I know the bulk of our staff are cleaning staff or general workers but at the supervisory and professional level, we need to be geared for the world where things move fast,” said Magewu.