The DA notes and welcomes the commitment made by the Environmental Management Inspectors (commonly called Green Scorpions) to investigate the sewer spill crises, directly affecting the Lowveld National Botanical Garden in Mbombela.
According to reports, since 2018, raw sewer from the Silulumanzi Sewer Pump Station (which is in the garden) has been spilling into the Botanical Garden forcing visitors and tourists to complain about the stench.
Loadshedding has made the situation worse, and unfortunately, the sewer is also overflowing to the Crocodile and Nels rivers which pass through the garden. Water and environmental laws are violated.
As the Lowveld National Botanical Garden is one of the most important tourist destinations in Mpumalanga, the DA then decided to send a complaint to the Green Scorpions to intervene, investigate, and deal with the culprits who are responsible for the sewer spillage. Many of the Mpumalanga Local Municipalities are failing in their responsibilities of wastewater and sewage disposal. This exposes residents to an environment that is harmful to their health.
This week, Nocawe Nkosi, the Ehlanzeni Compliance Monitoring & Enforcement officer of the Green Scorpions confirmed receiving the DA’s complaint. She also committed that our complaint will be “well investigated”.
During the latest Green Drop assessment for Mpumalanga, it was noted that 43% of our wastewater systems were deemed to be in a critical state and that only 6 out of the 76 systems in the province were operating well above capacity.
According to the National Environmental Management Act (107/1998), everyone has the right to have the environment protected, for the benefit of present and future generations through reasonable legislative and other measures that— prevent pollution and ecological degradation; promote conservation; and secure ecologically sustainable development and use of natural resources while promoting justifiable economic and social development.
The DA will await the investigation and report from the Green Scorpions, and we will take it from there.