Northern Cape - A councillor arrived at an economic development portfolio committee meeting in Kimberley wearing a gas mask, the Volksblad website reported on Friday.
Rooies Strauss, an African Christian Democratic Party councillor, was protesting against the health and environmental risk created by the local municipal dumpsite, outside Kimberley.
Strauss kept the mask on during the meeting. He told the newspaper that smoke and gas released by burning refuse at the main dumpsite were unhealthy and caused sicknesses.
He said most of the city's residents suffered from the effects of the dumpsite smoke.
“Sicknesses such as cancer, sinuses, emphysema and other related illnesses must be prevented,” he was quoted saying in the report.
Strauss said he thought inmates in Kimberley's newly-built prison lived in “gas chambers” due to the smoke.
DA committee member Philip Vorster told the newspaper most councillors at the meeting were not impressed by Strauss's protest.
“Strauss tried to make a point and I would say it was both successful and unsuccessful,” the report quoted Vorster saying. - Sapa