City’s filthy forgotten buildings
Retired lecturer doesn’t know where to turn as sewage seeps through her ceiling
SEWAGE leaking through ceilings, blatant drug dealing, overcrowding and no running water for 10 years.
These are part of everyday life in a “forgotten building” where services have vanished as arrears, differences among residents, an ombudsman hearing and lack of attention from government agencies have contributed to a messy mix.
Sewage from a flat upstairs leaks through the ceiling of Elizabeth Bunting’s home in Melbourne Court, Congella.
“It has even caused pieces of concrete to fall off. It would be dangerous if they dropped down into the road,” she said. “And I cover my stove with plastic.” She said two people who lived above her were partly responsible for her situation, claiming they were mentally challenged and, due to deaths in their family, had no one to keep an eye on them for the past two years.
“I even go up to their place sometimes and put paper down on the floor.”
Various state agencies have paid scant attention to the matter, said the retired lecturer.
“I don’t know where to go, who to turn to,” said Bunting, adding that she was constantly in and out of hospital with a health condition related to her living conditions.
In 2011, the eThekwini Municipality kept six flats in Melbourne Court and sold the remaining 64 to residents who, while having title deeds, have lived with ongoing deterioration around them.
Bunting’s flat, which she owns and has lived in for 30 years, is in what is believed to be a former military building. Bunting’s toilet and bathroom also has raw sewage leaks from above.
She said the noise from upstairs was unbearable.
Apart from a single outlet in a courtyard, the building has not had running water for more than a decade.
Buckets and bottles of water, with containers filled with detergents, occupy much of the floor space in Bunting’s flat and her toilet and bathroom.
“It is important to try to keep clean, so I pay the youth R5 a time to fetch water (from a downstairs tap),” she said.
Meanwhile residents have been divided over how to deal with their living conditions.
Law student Junior Prepcy, who has lived in Melbourne Court all his life, said the arrival of Shane Bruwer as a court-appointed administrator in 2018 had brought hope and optimism to residents. However, that relationship turned sour, with Bruwer saying 80% of residents had not paid their levies and Prepcy saying there was no point in doing so in the absence of service.
A matter is pending before the sectional title development ombudsman.
“The bottom line is you cannot do anything in that building until everyone pays levies,” said Bruwer, confirming that he had received a letter from the ombudsman to attend an adjudication hearing. He would not comment further.
Prepcy, in an effort to make his home more liveable, became a trustee on a board that residents elected in an initiative driven by the youth in the building.
“We are trying our level best with resources we have accumulated to help.”
However, there is concern about the legal status of the youth body.
Prepcy said he had found the administrator dismissive when he tried to communicate with him. He also said squatters had moved in when word got out that the administrator had said he would not set foot in the building.
Bruwer denied both accusations and said the building was so rundown that a fire department check would cause its closure and that no insurers were willing to insure it. “People go into the building to urinate and defecate. I pay the salary of the cleaner who has to clean it every day,” said Bruwer.
The residents have also found little help and much passing of the buck in their approaches to the departments of social service, health, police, metro police and the municipality, none of which responded to requests for comment.
Heather Rorick, who chairs the Bulwer safety forum and the executive citizen policing forum linked to Umbilo police station, said Melbourne Court was one of a number of buildings in which flats had been sold to residents, many of whom were in arrears and often unable to afford to look after the buildings.
She said that very often the few good tenants had the buildings’ problems lumped on them.
“They are forgotten buildings,” said Rorick.