Sol Plaatje Municipality’s roads and stormwater division removed debris, building rubble and other foreign objects from seven illegal dumping spots on the stormwater channel linked to the Tlhageng dam on Tuesday morning.
SOL PLAATJE Municipality’s roads and stormwater division removed debris, building rubble and other foreign objects from seven illegal dumping spots on the stormwater channel linked to the Tlhageng dam on Tuesday morning.
Many residents’ homes in the affected areas were flooded over the weekend during the heavy rains.
Municipal spokesperson Thabo Mothibi said they intend to close all drifts connecting to the channel in Convection Street and build a half-metre wall alongside it.
“We are appealing to members of the community to desist from illegal dumping,” added Mothibi.
Meanwhile, many areas of the city are still without water following the planned shutdown that was supposed to end on Monday.
Low-lying areas, including Galeshewe and Roodepan, reported that the water pressure was low and that there was sediment in the water.
Mothibi said that both the 600mm and 900mm pipelines were running from the Riverton water purification plant at around 600 litres per second.
“We will pump around 50 million litres per day into the reservoir. We will continue maintaining the supply volume at the treatment plant until work on the two clarifiers is completed, allowing for the ramping up of production. Once that is achieved, we will be able to take the pumps from line filling to normal operation and run on two pumps to boost the pressure.”
He appealed for patience while the pressure was building slowly in the system to prevent pipe bursts along the distribution network.
“We apologise for the low pressure in areas that have already started to receive water and the lack of water in high-lying areas.”
Mothibi said that they were busy with repair work on the South Ridge sub-station.
“Repair work is still in progress. Half of the area is still affected by an outage. Work was performed on eight mini sub-stations in the area, after one sub-station exploded and two more faults were located on an 11,000-watt volt cable.”
He added that a broken cable was being repaired at the Witdam sub-station in Galeshewe, which affected several areas including Bloemanda, Redirile and Blikkiesdorp.
“The electrical department is responding to a large number of individual household faults and those of businesses in Kimdustria,” said Mothibi.
“We are appealing to the public to bear with us. Our teams are on the ground and working around the clock to restore power supply in the wake of the storm that lashed Kimberley on Sunday and after yesterday’s heavy downpour.”
Mothibi urged residents to report all faults and to follow up with the call centre on 053 830 6111 or the toll-free number 0801 229 010.
