Municipality halts work at Glebelands
eThekwini Municipality employees were pulled out from Glebelands Hostel after a stash of guns were discovered.
|||Durban - The eThekwini Municipality has pulled out all its employees from Glebelands Hostel after concerns for their safety, apparently after refuse collectors discovered a stash of guns hidden in a bin.
Hostel residents have told of the discovery, but municipal manager S’bu Sithole would not say why municipal workers were threatened.
Sithole said it was not an easy decision to suspend services, but municipal workers’ safety was paramount. He said the employees were removed indefinitely.
“Safety concerns were brought to my attention and I had to take action. I’m planning to engage officials at the political level to see if there is no way of finding a solution to the hostel issue. This is a very sensitive issue and one needs to tread carefully, hence I decided to act,” Sithole said.
He said he was aware of the burst sewerage and water pipes and a meeting was to be convened on Monday to analyse the damage and assess the health hazards.
Asked about the guns and whether the suspension of services resulted from threats to return them to the owners or spot where they were found, Sithole said: “I can’t confirm the guns issue because I don’t know the people referred to. But when the issue of my employees’ safety was brought to my attention, I acted.”
On Sunday burst sewerage and water pipes in blocks S and R remained unattended and refuse had not been collected since the middle of last month.
A resident confirmed that a municipal worker had found the guns in a bin and had handed them to the authorities.
“Certain individuals then threatened to kill municipal employees if they did not return the guns,” he said.
“I have heard that they have since been returned to the spot where they were found in Block 52. After that incident the municipality redeployed its employees elsewhere. We talk in hushed tones about the incident,” the resident said.
Another resident confirmed the municipality’s hostel superintendent, his deputy and staff members responsible for cleaning, water and electricity services had been withdrawn.
“This has gone too far. We’ve had to contend with bullets and now we have running s*** right in the centre of our residence. People are getting killed almost every weekend, and instead of coming with a solution to the problem, the municipality is removing its employees, leaving us at the mercy of the heartless murderers.”
Daily News
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