Fed-up residents of Ga-Rankuwa Zone 2 in Tshwane are demanding service delivery to their area now, and not a day later.
To make their demands known, the aggrieved residents marched to the headquarters of the City’s municipality (Tshwane House) to deliver their memorandum.
According to activist and community leader who led the marching residents Tshepo Matlaela, the purpose of the march was to raise concern about lack of service delivery in Ga-Rankuwa Zone 2 throughout the years.
“Since I was born I have never seen a tarred road in our community yet Ga-Rankuwa has been in existence for more than 60 years,” lamented Matlaela.
“Our main concern is that tarred roads will be put in place in sections of Ga-Rankuwa like Zone 4 and Zone 5, yet Zone 2 will always be overlooked,” said Matlaela.
“We also have service delivery issues in Ga-Rankuwa like bushy areas which have not been cleared by the municipality and recently we had an incident whereby a corpse of a lady was discovered in the said uncleared bushes in Zone 1,” he said.
He said Ga-Rankuwa doesn’t have facilities for extramural activities like football grounds, tennis courts, cricket ovals, rugby fields, golf courses or netball courts and our youth are idle regarding the said sporting facilities,” said Matlaela.
“We are not fighting against the new administration of Tshwane as we know that it has only been in place for only two weeks, but we hope that they will listen to our demands unlike previous administrations which only catered for the needs of those living in the suburbs,” he said.
Matlaela pointed out that he has never seen any mayor or MMC of the City of Tshwane coming to Ga-Rankuwa to speak to residents regarding service delivery issues and that they feel neglected by the City of Tshwane municipality.
“Historically, Ga-Rankuwa has been neglected by all the previous administrations of the City of Tshwane,” fumed Matlaela.
“This negligence stops now because we are here to invite the municipality to come to Ga-Rankuwa to see for themselves the conditions under which we are living,” said Matlaela.
An elderly resident of Ga-Rankuwa who was part of the march told Tshwane Talks that he has been living in the area for many years now and appealed to the municipality to fix the dilapidated roads in Ga-Rankuwa which become muddy and impossible to walk in when it rains.
A woman resident from Ga-Rankuwa, who was also part of the march, told Tshwane Talks that she has been a resident of the area since August 1965 after being relocated from Lady Selbourne settlement area.
“We have been raising the issue of untarred roads for many years now and we even embarked on numerous shutdown activities without using any violence in the area, but our demands have fallen on deaf ears,” she said.
“When it rains we can’t move in the streets, we can’t go to the shops and the elderly among us have died before seeing the installation of proper tarred roads, while the younger ones are now 60 years old and therefore pensioners, yet they are still waiting to see tarred roads in Ga-Rankuwa Zone 2,” she lamented.
“In Zone 2 we don’t even know who our Councillor is, we are like idiots and nobody takes us seriously, including Tshwane House,” she said.
Reading the memorandum of Ga-Rankuwa residents, chairperson Windsor Menyoko said the following to MMC for Roads and Transport Tlangi Mogale:
“How can you promise to solve our service delivery problems while you have never come to Ga-Rankuwa to see what we are going through as residents? You would be telling us lies and we therefore invite you to come to Ga-Rankuwa”.
In response, Mogale appreciated the fact that residents of Ga-Rankuwa decided to deliver a memorandum to the City of Tshwane instead of burning tyres, shutting roads and destroying infrastructure in the area.
She said the 21 days given to the City of Tshwane was more than enough and that they as the municipality will respond within 7 days to their demands.
Mogale promised to go and visit Ga-Rankuwa Zone 2 within 7 days as matter of urgency.
Copy of a memorandum: