Durban - The eThekwini Municipality has built 1 400 proper toilets for as many homes in KwaMashu L section to the tune of R29.3 million during the 2018/19 financial year.
An amount of R35 million was budgeted for the project.
eThekwini Human Settlements and Infrastructure Committee had recently recommended that R6 million more to be made available to refurbish 2 350 more toilets for the neighbouring sections which are in a dilapidated state.
Requests for “minor” additions such as staircases and wheelchair ramps to the recently constructed toilets will also be made.
The houses in the sections are currently served with waterborne sewers with toilet structures located outside the main houses at the corner of each stand and water mains being mid-block.
According to a recent report by the committee, around 2005 the municipality built internal toilets which were never connected to the existing sewer system due to the houses being located below the sewer levels.
People then used the outside dilapidated toilets which have deteriorated to an extent that some of them need to be rebuilt.
The affected communities have threatened the city with service delivery protests as they felt the prevailing sanitation infrastructure challenges have been left unattended for far too long.
The Daily News reported in June 2018 that during his visit to wards 47 and 54 in Bester and KwaMashu areas, city manager Sipho Nzuza was greeted with appalling conditions and maggot-infested human waste.
At the time, Nzuza gave a graphic account of how residents survived with human waste in their homes, and how children played there as the community still used ventilated improved pit (VIP) toilets.
“I’ve never seen something like that. People staying in houses where there are no flushing toilets were sleeping next to open toilets overflowing with maggot-infested faeces. Just walking down the narrow road to the houses you see blocked stormwater drains. Children as young as five years old were playing, oblivious of the health hazards around them. What I saw was a disaster waiting to happen. I request to use Section 116 (3) to get funding to assist those people. Those toilets require immediate emptying to curb the spread of diseases and pollution,” Nzuza said at the time.