The Thembisile Hani Local Municipality has hit out at the City of Tshwane for claiming that its contractors had deliberately damaged the metro’s water infrastructure in Ekandustria last week.
This comes after the City undertook to investigate the local municipality’s contractors for causing damage to a 800mm pipe supplying water to the factories in Ekandustria in Region 7, while conducting excavations on Tshwane municipal property.
The City described the tampering as an act of sabotage, saying it was furnished with information regarding the alleged saboteurs of the water infrastructure.
Mayor Cilliers Brink said the contractors were operating outside of their municipality’s geographical boundaries.
Thembisile Hani’s assistant communications manager, Simphiwe Mokako, expressed disappointment at the City’s statement, saying it was “unfortunate, misleading, reckless and irresponsible”.
“We view this as not being issued in the spirit of cooperative governance as outlined by Chapter 3 of the Constitution of the Republic of South Africa, but one that is aimed at causing tensions in relation to the supply of bulk water”s, he said.
She said the local municipality had a 20ml command reservoir situated at the Ekandustria reservoir next to the City’s water reservoirs.
Mokako said there were communication protocols that were established at the beginning of the bulk water mediation led by the South African Human Rights Commission and the Department of Water and Sanitation as one of the participants, including Tshwane’s chief operating officer.
“Secondly, there is a standing agreement from the mediation process that Thembisile Hani will be reconfiguring its network at the reservoir site, through the water conservation and water demand programme, and these works were followed by a joint site inspection towards the end of the year 2023,” she said.
She said it was surprising to learn from the City’s media statement that Tshwane was not aware of the rationale behind the reconfiguration works.
Mokako said: “We further condemn the extract of the statement which seeks to promote segregation taking into consideration where the country comes from prior to 1994, and this is through them seemingly encouraging communities of the City of Tshwane to target the operational vehicles of Thembisile Hani.”
He said this was a potential threat to the lives of employees of Thembisile Hani while exercising their duties at that municipality reservoirs and pipelines, “situated on the registered servitudes at Ekangala with water coming from Rand water supply schemes.”
Thembisile Hani, she said, had tried unsuccessfully to reach out to the City’s group head of water and sanitation with a view to remedy the situation given that the pipes were accidentally damaged.
She added that her municipality had worked around the clock to make sure that the pipelines were repaired.
Pretoria News
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