“Maybe somebody will help us with these roads,” said a client who needs to travel in the industrial area of Louis Trichardt.

Mr Prince Ludere, owner of a liquor store in Madombidzha, is a regular wholesale client of the South African Breweries (SAB) depot in the industrial area.

“This whole road is tattered. I have damaged the rims of my vehicle because of the potholes, and I had to put in new bearings,” Mr Ludere said.

One of the directors of the SAB depot, Mr Eugene Maree, confirmed that the lack of proper access roads to the depot has inconvenienced their clients. The access road via Industria Street and round the corner of the pump station has been inaccessible for more than a year, due to the constant stream of sewage flowing over the road. The road with the sewerage dam is situated to the south of the depot and used to be their main access route.

“You can’t even drive there with a 4x4 vehicle. Underneath the water in the road, the erosion is about one meter deep,” said the depot´s distribution manager, Mr Jaco Wepener.

According to Maree, their contention with the Makhado Municipality has revolved around the sewage overflow at the pump station and the accompanying health risk for a long time. “There is often a lot of activity at the pump station, but to date we have yet to see the problem being resolved. We sometimes feel that reporting to the municipality is a futile exercise,” Maree said.

Another access road to the depot turns north out of Industria Road and west into Byles Street, which runs in front of the depot. This road, however, is riddled with potholes. Byles Street was tarred about two years ago but has since disintegrated. “The asphalt surface was too thin. It has to be taken into consideration that heavy trucks drive on roads in an industrial area,” Wepener said.

Now a new diagonal access road has developed out of need. Clients and staff of the depot turn off Industria Road and drive across the veldt to the depot. Large trucks have to turn from this dirt track into the gate in Byles Street. Whichever dilapidated access road the clients choose, they still have to drive along Industria Street, where one pothole in the middle of the road is so huge that it forces vehicles to squeeze past each other on one side of the pothole.

Questions concerning the budget for possible repair of Byles Street and Industria Road were put to the Makhado Municipality. The progress on the repair of the pump station and expenditure thereof were also requested.

The municipal spokesperson, Mr Louis Bobodi, replied on Tuesday that he was out of town but that answers would be forthcoming soon.

The CSIR states in a report that potholes on roads (excluding national roads) cost motorists R50 billion annually in repairing damage to their vehicles (www.privateprojects.co.za).