Rubber bullets fly as angry protesters shut down Makhanda

Frustrated Makhanda residents co-ordinated a shutdown of the city on Tuesday, with roads blocked and plumes of smoke rising from every corner.

Residents gathered at 3am at various points. They blocked roads with tyres and trees that were set alight.

At the intersection of Raglan Road and Edward Street, burning tyres stopped traffic from entering the CBD.

In Scott’s Farm, a bridge spanning a stream of raw sewage was barricaded with burning tyres.

Angry residents had chased mayor Yandisa Vara on Monday.

In Ghost Town, trees and tyres were burning on Currie Street, blocking the road.

While protesters allowed schoolchildren through to write exams, cars were stopped.

Taxi drivers in Raglan Road stepped in to clear the burning debris, creating a safe passage for schoolchildren and elderly residents.

Taxi driver Sanele Kubheka said that he disagreed with the protest.

“The people of Makhanda are trying to strike, but this is not a peaceful strike.

“They are burning tyres and closing the roads, so taxi drivers are trying to open the roads so children can go to school and workers can go to work.”

Until 10am, there was no police visible at any of the protest points.

Police later arrived in numbers, with 12 vehicles and close to 30 officers armed with shotguns and rubber bullets.

The sound of rubber bullets echoed through the valley between Scott’s Farm and Ghost Town.

Beryl Potgieter, 73, was shot at close range in the back of her head. Blood gushed out of the wound.

Potgieter’s distressed family members frantically phoned emergency services while the crowd grew increasingly agitated.

Two more women were also shot at close range with rubber bullets.

Police spokesperson Captain Marius McCarthy confirmed some protesters had been arrested.

“A violent group of protesters who threw stones at police at Scott’s Farm was dispersed by POPS following numerous warnings to disperse.

“A stun grenade and rubber bullets were used to disperse the group of about 200 protesters.

“A case of public violence was opened for further investigation.”

Tensions grew in the crowd as police moved back to their vehicles to reload at Scott’s Farm.

A large group appeared behind the protesters and police prepared for a standoff.

But then the crowd, more than 200 strong by then, turned around and started marching in the opposite direction.

The protest then moved into the Makhanda CBD, where people gathered outside the city hall, demanding the resignation of the mayor, municipal manager and speaker.

Municipal manager Pumelelo Kate arrived to hear residents’ grievances, months after they had handed him a memorandum during a similar protest in February.

Residents from various parts of Makhanda had turns to voice their frustrations, including the lack of water, electricity disconnections for unpaid tariffs, and other service delivery issues.

Kate listened to protesters and responded with a list of reasons for the situation in Makhanda.

He said the municipality would suspend electricity disconnections for the remainder of June to allow indigent residents to apply for a reduction of their municipal debt.

“The concerns that are raised by the community, the municipality is aware.

“These issues were raised and we attended to them two weeks ago with the mayor.

“We called a meeting, outlining to the community how we intend to address these problems.”

He said the mayor had initiated a project called Service Delivery Blitz to identify a hotspot and call in all the municipal services to fix as much as possible.

“We started that programme in one of the wards that is protesting here today.

“Unfortunately, the municipality was not allowed to continue on Monday due to protesters chasing the mayor away.

“We will continue engaging the community so we can continue with the programme and sort out these issues. Stand-offs are not going to help.

“We need to sort these issues out to avoid actions like this one today.”

Kate denied that residents had no water.

“The water is available to the communities, but there are certain areas which will always have problems and we send water trucks there.

“In terms of pumping water from our water schemes, they are functioning well. We have improved the situation of water delivery in Makhanda.”

He said the system was old and breaking all the time.

“Unfortunately, this municipality is financially distressed because we are not collecting enough to address all these problems at the same time.

He said the collection rate was around 52% but was expected to be 80%.

“How do you expect a municipality to operate on half of what it is supposed to be collecting?

“That is not an excuse because provincial and national governments are assisting the municipality through a conditional grant to make sure that we address road and water issues.

“Currently, the status of water provision is that we are providing water daily. Water is available except at night because we have to restrict it.

“Our main water treatment works are running on two of the required three pumps, and once the third pump has been secured we will be able to provide the required 20ML.

“We are currently achieving between 10 ML and 12 ML per day.”

Grahamstown Deserves Better chair Devon Waldick said he was disappointed with Kate’s response.

“We pushed the municipality to a level today, and all of them are hiding somewhere but we feel like we have achieved something.

“The municipal manager has promised to stop disconnections for one month, and we will encourage our people to come and make an arrangement with them.

“We won’t pay anything because we won’t pay for a service that we never have.

“We are going back to our different communities to report back and plan a way forward.

“Our ultimate goal here is to let our people walk out of their front doors and ask themselves, ‘Is this what we want to vote for?’

“It is utter nonsense what [the municipality] has said to us here today.

“Tomorrow we might strike again, depending on the meeting tonight, but our communities remain closed until the lights are reconnected.

“We want to thank the ANC for this mess they have given us, and we want to thank them for collapsing our once beautiful town.”

On the ground, residents echoed the complaints heard for months in Makhanda.

At the Ghost Town protest, resident Mziwoxolo Tom said that their cries had fallen on deaf ears for years.

“We have been asking our leaders to do things better for us because we don’t have roads, we don’t have housing, we have nothing.

“Sometimes we don’t have water for a week.

“What we heard from the municipality is that our areas, Zolani and Phakamani, are not on the map.

“We have been living in an informal settlement for 30 years but the municipality does not recognise us, and there are no services.

“We are demanding answers from the mayor and the councillors.”

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