We'll close the dam, warns frustrated beneficiaries

Beneficiaries still waiting to be compensated after being relocated when the Nandoni Dam was constructed are threatening to take the law into their own hands and close the taps at the dam, leaving communities without water.

“We have waited for such a long time and the department has sent us from pillar to post, but nothing is coming from it. In October last year, the Deputy Minister of Water and Sanitation, David Mahlobo, visited us and promised that we all would be paid our monies before the end of the year,” said the chairperson of the Nandoni Complaints Resolution Committee (NCRC), Solomon Baloyi.

“We are worried that the department is using delay tactics in terms of paying households affected by the construction of the Nandoni Dam. Now that the spread of Covid-19 is at a high rate, we suspect that they could be using the virus as a scapegoat,” he said.

According to Baloyi, the department is handing out offer forms, which are like salary advices, to the people and some have been getting letters for months now, but only 300 out of the 1 400 affected households have received their monies so far.

He said that they had written many memorandums to the department regarding the delay in payment, but the department just kept on making empty promises.  “We are considering toyi-toyiing and handing a memorandum over to the minister.”

Baloyi further said that when they met the Minister of Human Settlements, Water and Sanitation, Lindiwe Sisulu in December in Thohoyandou last year, they thought they would be compensated at last.

According to the spokesperson for the Department of Water and Sanitation (DWS), Sputnik Ratau, the process is underway. He said that, if one looked at the number of beneficiaries who had been paid over this period, they were clearly attending to the matter.

“What we can say is that not everyone will be paid on the same day and this is the process,” Ratau said and added that the DWS hoped to finalise all payments by the end of the financial year, which was the end of March.

News - Date: 15 January 2021

Silas Nduvheni

Email: