Efforts to keep the Kouga municipality clean were paying off — more so after the municipality’s mayor, Horatio Hendricks, drove through the northern areas in Gqeberha this weekend where litter and waste filled open spaces.
Hendricks delivered his state of the municipality address on Monday.
“The overgrown public open spaces strewn with litter and waste was a stark reminder of how over time things can become hopeless,” he said.
“I do not want this for Kouga. I want more,” he said.
Hendricks said in the past financial year, their attention remained on the development and expansion of the municipality’s six organisational goals.
This included keeping Kouga clean, serviced, green, safe, smart and growing.
He said the goals told the narrative of entrenching a system of good governance through service excellence in Kouga.
Kouga remained in a stable financial position, he said
The 2021/2022 R1.2bn adjustment budget was also approved by the council on Monday, which includes R1.1bn for the operating budget and R91m for the capital budget.
The operating adjustment budget reflects an increase of R36m compared with the 2021/2022 operating budget while the capital adjustment budget reflects an increase of R11m.
He said one of the biggest challenges the municipality faced was water security, due to the ongoing drought putting major pressure on the water supply systems.
“Water security and water quality, for the sake of current and future generations, must remain high on our agenda.”
Despite recent rains, dams that supply communities in the Kouga region remain critically low.
Kouga’s drought mitigation strategy continues to develop new boreholes to augment the water supply.
“To date, over 40 exploratory boreholes have been sunk.
“A total of 38 viable boreholes have been connected to the current water network.”
Hendricks said with the recent additional restrictions placed on underground water supply, it had become critical to turn attention towards the ocean for desalination and more reverse osmosis plants to purify existing borehole supplies.
“This will come at a great cost, but I want to give our residents the assurance that the provision of water will be a second-to-none priority,” he said.
The municipality has reduced water pressure to households across the region and is in the process of installing 200 water restrictors for high water users.
Education and awareness campaigns will also continue.
He said one aspect he was proud of was keeping Kouga clean.
A total of 425 tonnes of waste were recycled. It mostly consisted of paper and plastic.
To ensure the upkeep of sanitation services, the Patensie and the KwaNomzamo wastewater treatment works have been upgraded with R14m and R7m, respectively.
A R62m Hankey sewage network is under construction.
Hendricks said tarring of gravel roads and the resealing of roads was surging ahead.
About R10m had been pumped into the resealing of roads since July 2020 and thousands of potholes were fixed.
Just days ago, 200 houses at the Ebumnyameni informal settlement in Ocean View were electrified at a cost of more than R1.2-million.
Hendricks said Kouga’s next chapter was based on commitments and not promises.
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