When we were children, we didn’t pay much attention to the amenities in our homes such as having two bathrooms with a bath, shower and flushing toilets. We just assumed that everyone had a bathroom. It is something, as adults, we take for granted until we experience water restrictions or water outages and are not able to run a bath and flush a toilet.
For many underprivileged families living in informal settlements around Cape Town, a normal routine is using a bucket to relieve themselves or to use a broken toilet that does not flush… shared between 10 families.
There is no convenience of walking from the safety of your bedroom, down a passage to a clean and functional bathroom. For many living in townships, using a toilet at night can be risky as it requires taking a walk in the dark to a toilet a distance away and the chances of finding a workable toilet can be futile.
For the community of Overcome Heights informal settlement, the plea for functional toilets that have been broken and clogged for years has fallen on deaf ears.
I cannot count how often I’ve visited Overcome Heights, how many calls and pleas of help from residents I’ve received through the years.
Diligently, I would walk the township’s dusty streets with concerned and weary residents who raise their concerns of non-working broken toilets, sewage spills and overflowing rubbish which causes massive rats to invade their structures.
Last year December, the residents pleaded “All we want is working toilets”.
At the time, I raised the issue with the City of Cape Town who vowed to repair toilets.
However, the toilets they aimed to fix were a field away from residents and not the toilets in question.
At the time, the City claimed that “maintenance and operational teams responded to service requests for the area as received, which includes the fixing of toilet doors.”
The City did fix the toilets situated a distance away, however, the broken toilets of more than a year ago, allocated to the residents who complained had still not been repaired.
As a journalist, I’ve always felt highlighting issues which the underprivileged faced was a way to somehow bring about change.
Even if that was a small change, something that we may think is trivial but makes a big difference in someone else’s life.
I’ve once again raised the issue of broken toilets with the City. I pointed out that their claim to “respond to service requests as received” is simply false as they were made aware of dozens of families suffering and being forced to use buckets to relieve themselves.
It genuinely pains me to see the poverty and suffering in the communities I frequent, to see children growing up thinking it is normal to use buckets to relieve themselves. What pains me even more, is when the issues I have highlighted and addressed with authorities are simply ignored or swept aside with excuses.
Responding to my statement that the City’s claim to the People’s Post last year of “maintenance teams responding to service requests as received” are false, Mayco member for water and sanitation Zahid Badroodien commented: “The toilets you are referring to have been severely vandalised by the community. The doors have been kicked in, toilets filled with rubble and cisterns stolen. These toilets are now unfortunately beyond repair and have therefore been condemned. They will have to be removed from where they are located.”
He further added that the sewer line that services the full flush toilets (FFTs) is misused, with construction material and other foreign objects being dumped into the network.
“In order to replace these toilets, the sewer line also has to be cleared. It is difficult to do this as the manholes have been built over and buried almost 500mm deep, making this entire replacement process a difficult and lengthy one. As a result, the design report for the replacement of the toilets has required additional time to prepare.”
Badroodien added while the flush toilets were not operational, the City provided chemical and portable toilets.
“Please note that the community is serviced by chemical and portable flush toilets. This means that there is currently access to sanitation services while the full flush toilets have been taken out of use.”
