Residents of Port Alfred are all too well aware of the sewage problems, encountered daily.
Ndlambe Municipality has stated that the infrastructure is old and needs to be replaced and repaired.
However, since the municipality has done very little to maintain or upgrade the sewerage it inherited 21-years ago, and very little was done to increase the capacity (due to considerably more residents using water-borne sewerage), or to check the integrity of the sewerage system over this period, it was inevitable that pipes and pumps would fail and need to be replaced.
Only now has Ndlambe municipality put a major effort into repairing the system, employing a specialist company to assist in fixing the infrastructure which has now failed in many areas and is leaking raw sewage onto the streets, particularly in the CBD.
Initially, Ndlambe’s Infrastructure Development director, Noluthando Vithi, invited Talk of the Town to report on the work being carried out on the sewerage system and said we would be updated weekly on progress. However, this did not happen and TotT has asked Vithi to update us on progress so far.
The sewage problem is a big issue as the sewerage processing plant is to be used in the recovery of potable water through a specialised reverse osmosis (RO) plant. This project has now been pushed backward to September.
TotT will report back on the issue of sewage leaks when answers are received from the municipality.
