Court gets tough with municipality over dumpsite

In a far-reaching judgment, Judge Murray Lowe also found Ndlambe municipal manager Rolly Dumezweni guilty of contempt of court for failing to heed a 2009 court order to address the municipality’s sewerage system, which resulted in numerous raw sewage spills into the once-pristine Bushman’s River estuary.

It had eventually done so in 2014, but had been in contempt of the order for some years before that.

Lowe stopped short of jailing Dumezweni – who is also an advocate – for his contempt, instead issuing him with a warning.

Kenton-on-Sea Ratepayers’ Association, along with the Bushman’s Kariega Estuary Care Management Forum and the Natures Landing Homeowners’ Association, in 2014 resorted to court to force the municipality to clean up its sewage and solid waste mess.

Lowe described the case, which included almost 1 000 pages in affidavits and documentation, as a sad tale of frustration and anxiety on the part of the residents of Kenton-on-Sea and Bushman’s River.

The illegal and over-full dumpsite had been mismanaged, was largely unfenced, and burnt constantly, so polluting the area with toxic smoke.

Lowe declared that the municipality had breached its constitutional and statutory obligations in respect of refuse removal, refuse dumps and solid waste disposal at the dumpsite.

The judgment was in the form of a structural interdict, which means the municipality will have to report regularly to the court on progress made towards implementing its orders.

It must report to the court on July 14 on steps it is taking to decommission the old site and commission a new one, as well as steps it is taking to heed his other orders.

Neither Dumezweni nor Ndlambe mayor Sipho Tandani could be reached for comment.