Nelson Mandela Bay Municipality says grievances raised by Walmer protests have been noted

The Nelson Mandela Bay Municipality on Thursday afternoon  said that it has noted the concerns expressed by members of the Walmer community regarding service delivery.

"Indeed, we have been in continuous engagement with all our communities including Walmer on all areas of service delivery, with the understanding that, as government, we are here to provide services to our communities within the parameters of government processes and within the resources that are available to us," said Nelson Mandela Bay Municipality Director of Communications, Roland Williams.

He said that since Wednesday, when Walmer residents embarked on a violent protest - blocking off roads, they had also disrupted the services that the municipality was delivering to the area, including the major water and sanitation system that is being constructed there. 

"In order to diffuse the situation, Deputy Executive Mayor, Bicks Ndoni, MMC for Human Settlements, Cllr Tontsi and MMC for Infrastructure & Engineering, Cllr Mfunda, met with representatives of the community and explained to them the housing processes, including the PHP (Peoples Housing Process), and the fact that we would engage with and arrangea meeting with Province in this regard," Williams said.

"We were surprised to see that the protest action continued unabated today; we had expected the representatives with whom we had met to report back to the group and explain the progress made in this regard.

"Today, we again met with the protestors. Cllrs Mfunda and Tontsi were accompanied by Ward Councillor Benya and relevant officials from the various units to provide a briefing to the protestors. Also present were community leaders and representatives of NAFCOC."

He said that all areas of service delivery concern were duly noted by the NMBM representatives and actions for each of these items were pronounced upon.

"The Municipality fully understands should communities wish to express their frustrations and concerns. Indeed, Executive Mayor Dr Danny Jordaan has insisted that all officials ensure that services are delivered on time every time at the right standard and quality," Williams said.

"At the same time, we urge all our communities to make use of the various engagement platforms that exist within the Municipality, as resorting to unlawful, illegal and disruptive actions will not help the cause of improving service delivery.

"We are committed to serving all our people efficiently and effectively and have an open-door policy in this regard. There is thus no need for anyone to embark on actions that will disrupt the very services that we are delivering to the people."