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If the municipality cannot do it, we will.
That’s the word of dozens of fed up Nelson Mandela Bay residents who are fixing potholes, mowing lawns, removing trash and painting road markings themselves.
For months, residents watched weeds begin to creep up sidewalks, grass grew, road markings faded, and illegal dumps grew amid municipal inaction.
Then they took action.
The metro’s lawn mowing contract expired at the end of January, causing the city’s public facilities to become increasingly neglected and dangerous.
On Wednesday, city spokeswoman Mamela Ndamase said acting city manager Anele Qaba had signed a contract with lawnmowers.
“The service is normally provided by external service providers and as everyone knows, mowing the lawn was not an essential service during the Covid-19 declaration.
“While that was the case, the contracts we had with those service providers expired.
“There is already an ongoing process to designate service providers to provide the service.
“The city is involved in an effort to speed up the process.
“U.S [are] hoping that the matter will be resolved in the next few days, ”said Ndamase.
Qaba said on Friday that the metro had failed to renew several contracts due to delays ranging from objections and investigations to interdictions and resulting court proceedings.
“In some cases, the award of contracts is delayed because the tender objection committee sends them for re-evaluation.
“In cases where residents waited for service delivery even before closure, service delivery may have been delayed due to contracts whose award process was delayed for similar reasons.”
Qaba did not have specific details and dates of the contracts that had expired, but said there were several.
“There is an ongoing supply chain process, but I have come up with ways to get [services] while we finish the process, because it is an emergency.
“Management is busy assigning contractors,” he said.
The Walmer Renewal Association, which is already trying to maintain the Walmer, Baakens Valley, and St George’s Park areas at its own cost, has been mowing lawns, painting road markings, filling potholes, and clearing debris and trash in the areas.
They pay out of their own pockets and collect donations to buy equipment and hire occasional workers twice a week.
In Missionvale, unemployed resident Christopher Smith, 20, borrows a wheelbarrow and travels 10 to 15 km a day to collect sand and repair potholes.
Smith started doing this with three friends two years ago and more residents have since joined.
“I noticed people were complaining about potholes damaging their cars, especially after it rained, and I decided to do something about it,” Smith said.
Concerned about the worsening state of New Brighton during the closure, a group of youth from the community raised funds to purchase garbage bags for garbage collection and borrowed equipment to cut weeds on Mandela and Mahlangu streets.
Now they are transforming an illegal landfill into a park.
“We have collected old tires and painted them brightly so that we can place them as makeshift chairs for people to sit on,” said community member Anele Zephe.
