For far too long, the residents of the City of Ekurhuleni have had to endure the pain of driving on hazardous roads plagued by potholes. The situation is a result of years of poor service delivery under the previous administration. We have responded to the calls from residents for the Municipality to deliver the most basic of services. As such, Alderman Tania Campbell, Executive Mayor of the City of Ekurhuleni is glad to announce that the Multi-Party Coalition Government has allocated R285 million towards intensifying the war on potholes in the city.
On Wednesday, 15 June, myself and Members of the Mayoral Committee launched our ‘War on Potholes’ campaign in Boksburg as part of our Back-to-Basics Service Delivery Programme. The much-needed capital injection towards maintaining the city’s roads will boost investor confidence in the city and transform our roads into safe transport infrastructure routes for our residents to enjoy. The campaign will stretch across all regions of the city and will seek to catch up on the service delivery backlog created by our predecessors.
The city’s Department of Roads and Stormwater has projected that it intends to patch 82 500 square metres of potholes by the end of the upcoming financial year. Over and above the recent budget adjustment, the Multi-Party Coalition recently endorsed the nongovernmental organisation, ‘Better Bedfordview’ and their campaign to patch potholes in the Bedfordview area. The decision to endorse Better Bedfordview forms part of Multi-Party Coalition Government’s objective of developing a holistic infrastructure strategy which combines the imperatives of an increased spend on maintenance, infrastructure renewal and leveraging Private-Public-Partnerships to enhance service delivery in the city.
I urge all residents to report potholes on the ‘My Ekurhuleni Service Delivery App’ or call into the city’s call centre to report a pothole. The Multi-Party Coalition Government will continue conducting oversight visits to pothole hotspots across the city, to ensure work is being done to service residents.