“I like living here, but the problem is this.”
Mavis Sali, 79, points to a meadow of exquisitely green kikuyu grass in the dip behind her house on the north-eastern edge of Ekuphumleni.
During the rainy season, a little stream crosses the track there. But it’s been dry for weeks and the water in the furrow leading away from Sali’s yard stinks: it’s raw sewage.
Talk of the Town was alerted to the situation by local community activist Mike Konaha, who sent a photo of Sali, spade in hand, digging that furrow last Friday (February 14).
The next day TOTT went to the site. It’s not clear exactly why the sewer is overflowing and we’ve asked Ndlambe’s infrastructure directorate to confirm what waste water removal system is in place in that part of town. But what we understood was that when it happens, sewage pours out of a pipe from a neighbour’s yard, into the yard next door to Sali’s and dams up against their garage and wall. Various holes and bits of pipe have been placed and/or blocked in various places to try and stall the horrible flow.
The next-door neighbour has a beautiful vegetable garden, with dark green spinach, tomatoes and pumpkin.
“But no one can eat that now,” says Konaha. “This was all covered in sewage.”
Sitting in the shade outside another neighbour’s house, Sali talks about a wholesome childhood on a farm in the Sevenfountains area. When her (later) employer left the farm, so did she.
She’s active and healthy in an environment not too far removed from that of her childhood. Walk up the track to the top of the hill and look north-eastwards: framed by a hedge of sky-blue plumbago, about half an hour’s hike away, the Kariega River makes its final turn before it reaches the R72 bridge and the beautiful beaches of Kenton-on-Sea.
Like many families do, Sali keeps some chickens. She’d like to grow vegetables, but under the circumstances, it’s pointless.
Konaha said he’d brought the problem of sewage spills there to the attention of Ndlambe’s infrastructure department: they’d come and done a temporary fix, but hadn’t resolved the problem.
“I’ve told them what needs to be done,” Konaha said. “But they won’t listen.”
TOTT asked Ndlambe Municipality: What type of wastewater system is in operation in the north-eastern part of Ekuphumleni (Ngaseholweni)? What is the cause of this system becoming overloaded or blocked? What is the remedy and what will it take to achieve it? We hope to publish their response in next week’s edition.
The councillor for Ward 4, under which Ekuphumleni falls, is SImphiwe Kolosa. He was aware of Sali’s sewage problem, he said.
“This problem already existed before I became ward councillor in 2021,” Kolosa said. He said he had called infrastructure officials to resolve the problem; however, he hadn’t received any feedback.
“I will go there myself and check what can be done to immediately resolve the problem,” Kolosa said. “I will speak to the municipal manager and the infrastructure directly and ask them for time frames to fix this.”
Half an hour after TOTT’s call, Kolosa sent photographs showing the trench was dry.
“I’m not sure why – it may be because the tenants in the house where the spills originate are away.”
He said a neighbour had explained that the fact that a garage had been built on top of the sewerage pipe was part of the problem.
“But I will keep monitoring it,” Kolosa said.
- This article was first published in Talk of the Town, February 20, 2025. The newspaper serving the communities of Ndlambe and the Sunshine Coast, with a weekly wrap of Makhanda news, is available at stores from early on Thursdays.
