MUSINA – Disgruntled inhabitants of various communities in Musina are to stage a protest march against a growing list of unresolved problems, seriously affecting their quality of life.

Residents feel that the Municipal Council of Musina is dragging its feet over various problems causing severe hardship and safety hazards to residents. In the communities of Campbell and Harper, residents are up in arms against what they see as a serious neglect in the provision of amenities and services and the seemingly disinterest of "the ruling elite" to assist the mostly indigent population through job creation.

In parts of Ward 4 in Nancefield residents insist that the municipality should come up with a relocation solution to the mostly aged owners of previous municipal houses, which are damp and crumbling as a result of chronic water seepage. Residents are also seriously disappointed at the lack of meaningful assistance to families left homeless after a recent windstorm that ripped off the roofs of amongst others RDP houses. In one of these houses, a toddler sustained serious head injuries when an RDP house imploded.

Concerned neighbours rushed the child, Gladys Ndou, to hospital. She was treated and received several stitches on her forehead. Neighbours say the family had to move in with other people elsewhere in Nancefield. Although the disaster struck towards the end of December last year, the ruined RDP house is still roofless with some walls that have tumbled down. There appears to be no official assistance in the offing to help restore the family's house.

In Nancefield's Ward 4 a journalist last week visited a community of predominantly elderly people who suffered severe losses as a result of water seepage into municipal houses, built on a wetland area.

"I had to rip out all the matting on the floors which are soaked by water, which keeps on coming up through the floors. I lost almost all my furniture," stated an elderly lady, who pointed to the severely cracked walls, rusted doorframes, wet floors and demolished carpets.

"We are forced to just keep on living in this wet and damp surrounding, with houses which may at any time start tumbling down. After the situation was brought to the attention of the municipality, they dumped some gravel around the houses to remedy the marsh like surface conditions prevailing in the entire area. This did nothing to alleviate the conditions inside the dwellings."

According to the residents some application forms for relocation were delivered at some of the houses, but they do not know if their plight is receiving any further attention. They are furious about allegations that there is no alternative housing available.

"What happened to all those stands in Phase 13 in Matswale and to all that building material the government donated?" they wanted to know.

When the notorious Phase 13 was visited, the only evidence of what was supposed to be a housing showpiece development, sponsored by Government, were unguarded heaps of bricks laying around in the open field amongst numerous "one line" foundations in an extended area, which allegedly contains several hundreds of residential plots. It is alleged that sufficient building material was once delivered here to erect several hundreds of houses.

In the Campbell and Harper residential areas, many residents had until recently access only to fairly primitive communal ablution facilities which most of the time are in an appalling condition.

"We are forced to use the bushes, because it is unsafe to go into some of those places."

Residents complain that even those toilets, which were erected on residential stands, remain unconnected to the water reticulation system and can therefore not be used.

Most of these communities can boast impressively styled satellite clinic buildings.

"They stand empty. One of them is now used as a taxi stand," the inhabitants say.

A community which lives on a ridge between the "new" municipal dumping site and a sewage installation, claim that these facilities were established on their ancestral land and should be moved elsewhere. In their struggle to establish an agricultural project there, they say they collided head-on against the intransigence of the municipality, who eventually cut off their water supply. This community now obtain its drinking water from a communal toilet hundreds of meters away in an adjacent residential area. Council insists that the community members - styled as the Farasanani Farming Project - should relocate to a nearby residential area.

"We do not want to live in town. We want to develop our project and live and produce as a farming community," spokesperson Joseph Sitsei said. He is still hopeful that a solution will be found to enable them to fulfil their agricultural ambitions. In the meantime the entire community is exposed to the lack of proper sanitary conditions prevailing in the vicinity of the dumping site.

A formal application has been lodged with the Musina Municipal Council for a procession from the Nancefield Community Hall to the municipal offices in Irwin Street in Musina on March 14. A petition is to be handed over to the Mayor of Musina at he Municipal Offices.

The Municipal Manager of Musina Municipality, Mr Abram Luruli, said on enquiry that his administration has no problem with the principle that any group can express its views through an orderly march. He would recommend to Council the approval of the march. The final decision is with Council.

With regards to problems in the Harper and Campbell communities, Mr Luruli said according to his information the water toilets, which were erected there, were connected and functioning. He will investigate the situation. As far as the clinics were concerned, he denied that the buildings were standing idle and empty.

"They are not operational on a daily basis, but are satellite clinics served on a rotation basis by the municipal nurse who is also in charge of the fulltime basic health care clinic in Nancefield. It is possible that residents are not well informed about the dates and times that the nurse is available at the satellite buildings. This situation will have to be corrected."

Mr Luruli said the relocation of Ward 4 residents are in progress. They will be relocated to RDP houses, which will have to be provided by the Provincial Department of Local Government and Housing. They have already been approached and the request is already being processed. Assistance to the residents, whose houses were damaged during the December storms, is also being dealt with through applications to the District authorities. It does take some time. Owners, who have in the meantime mended their own houses, will be reimbursed as soon as the money becomes available from the appropriate authorities.

Mr Luruli says the housing project in Nancefield Extension 8 (Matswane) ran into problems due to the fact that the contractor appointed by the provincial department, failed to discharge his responsibilities. A new contractor has already been appointed and the project, comprising 250 RDP houses, will be completed. He said he was not aware of building material being removed from the sites. The previous contractor was busy with the provision of services and foundations in some cases, but did not as yet reach the stage where he could start building, when the contract was terminated after two years.