Activities at Transnet Ports of Durban have been suspended until further notice due to a spill that poses a severe risk to diving personnel, marine life and activities such as angling.
The spill was noticed on Thursday, 4 November. Transnet Durban Port manager, Mpumi Dweba-Kwetana, said talks with the municipality indicated that Mahatma Gandhi Sewer Pump Station broke down. She said the community will be updated about any further developments. Stakeholders, who have raised numerous concerns on how the municipality has failed to maintain its infrastructure resulting in such hazardous occurrences, are up in arms as the sewage spills are now the norm with a few re-occurrences over the past couple of months. One of the boaters, who took a video which circulated on social media, said this was the worst spill he has ever seen.
“There are faeces everywhere, and sanitary pads floating everywhere, the water colour has changed and it’s difficult for the boaters to get into the water to wash their boats. There is a thick residue at the bottom. The boats are filled with sewage. We can’t even launch our boats,” he said.
EThekwini Municipality spokesperson, Msawakhe Mayisela, conceded that some of the city’s pump stations happened to malfunction. “This is largely as a result of vandalism and unrelenting loadshedding. Moving from one loading stage to the next happened to occur haphazardly, leaving us with very small room to shut down some of the stations to avoid them discharging raw sewage into the port.”
Mayisela said the municipality is conducting its assessment, however, stated that the water was still safe to be used. He said in the event that the situation gets out of hand, eThekwini will apprise the public.
“It should be noted that this is the situation that is beyond our control and we appeal to the public to work with us. We fully understand the inconvenience it is causing. The city has processes that are currently underway to look into procuring generators to over 200 pump stations. Each generator costs in excess of R2 million. The city is working around the clock to normalise the situation and there is no need to panic,” Mayisela added.
He said the repairs can be expected to be completed by Thursday, 11 November. The Democratic Alliance’s member of parliament, Hannah Winkler, also a member of the Environment, Forestry and Fisheries Committee, has launched a petition in this regard which is currently circulating on social media for concerned community members and stakeholders to sign that will be taken to parliament soon.
An oversight visit was conducted on Wednesday, 10 November, led by DA caucus leader, Nicole Graham, and Hannah Winkler, Member of the Parliament, also a member of the Environment, Forestry and Fisheries Committee and Heinz de Boer, also a Member of Parliament, alongside Ward 26 PR Councillor, Sharmaine Sewshanker, and councillors Goeff Pullan and Mzamo Voda.
The oversight started at Mahatma Gandhi Pump Station where three pumps were broken with only one pump functioning.
According to an inside source, loadshedding had an impact on the malfunctioning of the pumps. “For the pump station not to flood, two pumps have to be functional. In this case, there were three and one spare, two of them stopped working and the spare had to kick in, but when there was loadshedding, the third one was affected,” claimed the source.
He said the next step to be taken by the municipality is to secure funding for the repairs or replacements, however, it can take a while. “Generators also need to be installed as back-up for when there is loadshedding. The main problem is vandalism, however, hopefully the municipality will be able to sort the matter out as soon as possible,” further claimed the source.
He alleged that e-coli tests were done at the beaches and the results have come back negative.
The DA leadership and councillors were also told that the water at the harbour was looking much cleaner as the harbour cleans itself up when there is a high tide. The DA leaders said they will hold a meeting before giving comment on their findings and resolutions to the problem.
