Call centre woes, dry taps and power outages ... Nelson Mandela Bay ‘in paralysis’

With municipal phone lines down for days, councillors across Nelson Mandela Bay became the city’s unofficial call centre, fielding hundreds of complaints daily as residents grappled with water outages, power cuts and a growing list of service delivery failures.

Landlines at ward offices and the call centre were silent since Tuesday and residents had been unable to log service delivery complaints.

The municipality said the service was restored on Thursday.

The call centre helps residents quickly get a reference number, which then generates a job card for water or electricity issues.

Online options were also unavailable.

A similar situation happened in September when landlines were suspended as the metro owed MTN R9.6m.

The latest incident comes as a major outage left large parts of Nelson Mandela Bay without water early on Thursday.

Almost 50 areas were without or had an intermittent supply.

The biggest challenge appeared to be problems with securing treatment chemicals.

On Wednesday, the western suburbs were without water.

This came as residents had been forced to deal with eight unplanned power outages since Monday.

Municipal spokesperson Sithembiso Soyaya said landline and internet services had been fully restored.

“The temporary interruption was resolved following engagements between the municipality and the service provider, with connectivity now reinstated across affected municipal facilities,” Soyaya said.

“As a public institution entrusted with managing public funds, it is standard practice for the municipality to undertake the necessary governance due diligence, verification and account reconciliation processes before payments are effected.

“These measures form part of the municipality’s financial governance and oversight responsibilities and are intended to ensure that all payments are accurate, compliant and free from any potential irregularities.

“As the matter involves ongoing administrative and account reconciliation processes between the parties, the municipality will not be commenting on specific contractual, billing or financial details.”

When the general call centre (0800-205-050) and the electricity fault centre (041-506-5595) were contacted at 4pm on Thursday, no agents were available.

Ward 5 councillor Terri Stander said that since municipal lines went down on Tuesday, she had received more than 800 messages from residents reporting power and water outages, power surges, or an inability to reach the call centre.

“We’ve had electricity issues on and off for months now, but on Youth Day residents complained of surges that had damaged their electrical appliances, particularly in Havelock Street,” Stander said.

“There was a voltage issue that caused electricity to trip at one person’s house, which then resulted in a broader outage in Havelock Street.

“I had 835 WhatsApp messages that had come in because people weren’t able to get hold of the municipality at all.

“Even though Havelock Street was restored on Wednesday, people are still experiencing electricity challenges.

“There are some businesses that have a separate issue from the instability of the grid.”

Ward 55 councillor Thanduxolo Doda said he felt like a makeshift call centre.

“We’ve now had to put on hold other service delivery issues to process calls to the municipality.

“We’ve been given this extra workload and are working more than ever.

“This is a very difficult time for us politically, and on top of that, you now have to be a call centre as well.”

Doda said his wards had a critical sewer problem, with sewage overflowing due to blockages.

“This is a problem for us, and one of the pump station lines doesn’t get relieved in terms of sewage.”

Doda said more than 30 residents showed up at his office because they could not contact the municipality.

“When that happens, they want to see the councillor in front of them processing their queries.”

Ward 51 councillor Roelf Basson said he was passing complaints to officials regardless of whether they responded.

“We’ve had to stand in and are busy reporting complaints for them because residents can’t get their complaints to the city due to the call centre.

“The app is also inaccessible.

“The complaints are sent to service departments without reference numbers.”

Basson said that water had been a major problem for Kariega since the May floods.

“We’re experiencing intermittent supply from both Nooitgedacht and Kabah treatment works, which are supplied by the Groendal Dam.

“A lot of muddy water came in and clogged the filter system at the Kabah treatment works.

“We had a situation where we had no water for five hours.

“Sometimes we won’t have water when we go to bed.

“The water comes back during the night but when you get up around 7am the next morning there’s no water.

“People are extremely frustrated and I’m frustrated as well.

“And we don’t really get explanations on what the problem is.”

Basson said the situation had improved slightly in the last 24 hours.

In a statement on Thursday, the municipality, despite the metro’s dams being at full capacity, said that low pressure and complete water outages were being experienced.

“These disruptions are the result of several operational challenges that have severely impacted the city’s ability to produce and distribute treated water consistently.”

The metro attributed the water outage to a combination of factors.

These included flood-related high turbidity levels that reduced treatment plant output, repeated power interruptions at key water facilities, challenges in securing essential treatment chemicals, and excessive daily water consumption that continued to place severe strain on the system and deplete reservoirs.

“The cumulative impact of these challenges has left many strategic reservoirs operating at critically low levels, with some reservoirs nearly empty.

“The water supply system is currently operating under severe strain, making it highly vulnerable to any operational interruption.”

Some of the reservoir levels included:

• Chelsea Reservoir – 7%;
• Emerald Hill Reservoir – 2%;
• Heatherbank Reservoir – 3%;
• Lovemore Heights Reservoir – 4%;
• Gelvandale Reservoir – 2%;
• Greenbushes Reservoir – 13%;
• Fort Nottingham Reservoir – 7%;
• Fairview Reservoir – 11%; and
• Rosedale Reservoir – 0%.

The municipality has deployed water tankers to affected areas while working to maximise water production and pumping capacity.

It is closely managing reservoir levels and getting chemical supplies.

However, Nelson Mandela Bay Business Chamber chief executive Denise van Huyssteen said the city’s explanations on the water outage must not obscure the fundamental issue that, despite the dams overflowing, the metro continued to face a water management crisis.

“A well-managed metro plans for foreseeable risks, maintains resilient infrastructure and ensures that essential services can withstand operational challenges,” she said.

“The current crisis is a clear indication that the metro’s water system has been allowed to deteriorate through years of infrastructure neglect, inadequate maintenance and poor oversight.”

She said it was unacceptable that the problems continued while the municipality forfeited infrastructure grants.

“At a time when the metro faces mounting infrastructure challenges across multiple service delivery fronts, there can be no justification for returning funds intended to maintain and upgrade critical infrastructure.

“Residents and businesses are paying the price for these ongoing shortcomings through worsening service delivery, deteriorating infrastructure and declining reliability of essential services.

“Access to clean water is a basic constitutional right and one of the municipality’s most fundamental obligations.

“The widespread water outages affecting households, schools, healthcare facilities, businesses and residents represent a serious transgression of human rights.”

She said businesses were being forced to incur high additional costs to secure alternative water supplies and maintain operations.

“Moreover, this causes additional reputational damage to the metro as an investment destination and comes at a time when our local economy is under severe strain, as evidenced in the recent business closures and retrenchments.

“The metro cannot continue to lurch from one service delivery crisis to the next while the root causes of infrastructure decline remain unaddressed.

“Businesses pay rates and taxes for the delivery of basic services and as such the municipality has a responsibility for ensuring this takes place.”

Nelson Mandela Bay Civil Society Coalition chair Monga Peter warned that the metro had slipped into paralysis.

He said this was a result of persistent leadership failures, poor governance, weak accountability and an inability to execute the most basic functions.

“Nearly five months after the launch of the service delivery scorecard on January 28, every priority area identified remains firmly in the red,” Peter said.

“Despite repeated engagements, detailed recommendations and practical interventions proposed by civil society, the municipality has failed to implement meaningful corrective action while residents, communities and businesses continue to bear the devastating consequences of worsening service delivery failures.”

He said the city’s decline was no longer characterised by isolated service delivery failures but by a systemic collapse across multiple government functions.

“The evidence before us points to a city in paralysis,” Peter said.

“Essential services are failing simultaneously, infrastructure is collapsing, investor confidence is deteriorating and municipal leadership continues to offer apologies instead of accountability, urgency and decisive action.

“Residents and businesses are being forced to navigate a city that is increasingly unable to perform the most basic functions expected of local government.

“This is not a temporary setback or an isolated crisis; it is the consequence of sustained leadership failures and years of neglect.

“The metro is facing widespread water outages affecting communities and businesses across Nelson Mandela Bay.

“Entire suburbs have been left without water for extended periods as a result of failing infrastructure and inadequate maintenance.”

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