PMB residents up in arms over ongoing sewerage spillage
Residents living along the Mkondeni Spruit in Pietermaritzburg say their children and pets are getting sick from sewerage overflow polluting the water.
A video circulating on social media shows brown water, believed to be raw sewerage, gushing out above the stream and mixing with a white foamy effluent seen floating in the water.
Luthando Radebe believes the stench coming from the stream is behind his daughters' ill health.
"I have got four daughters, so two of my daughters are affected where their breathing is as if they have flu, but it is not the flu or anything like that. Their eyes are always watery, and they start vomiting. We have not noticed on their necks a rash or something."
Radebe says they are even considering moving.
The Cleland and Meadows Resident and Ratepayer Association's Maureen Govender says it's been an ongoing issue.
"We have been at the municipality for weeks on end. Apparently, it has been going on for a long time - from last year, when it got to a point where everyone got involved complaining. The smell is so bad that people can't open the wind near the streams where they live."
Ward 36 Councillor Douglas Roberts says Msunduzi Municipality is aware of the pollution.
"We have trucks that are sitting in the workshops that are not being used, and when a number of us councillors approach them to hire trucks, we were told they can only hire once a week.
"That is definitely not enough. Sort out the situation we got at Msunduzi. The whole of Msunduzi is floating in sewage."
