The service delivery challenged community of Sharpville was on Thursday once again the centre of political attention from political parties as the country commemorated the 64th anniversary of the Sharpeville massacre in which 69 people died on March 21, 1960.
Among the parties that vied for the hearts and minds of the community of Sharpeville were Build One SA (Bosa), the EFF, ANC, Rise Mzansi, Ace Magashule’s African Congress for Transformation (ACT), ACDP, the MK Party and the PAC.
These attention-grabbing acts of electioneering took place right in the middle of a potholed and unfinished Seeiso Street.
In a community of unpaved roads, pothole-riddled streets and other service delivery challenges, scores of residents decried the lack of political will to deal with the socio-economic challenges affecting them.
“There is no service delivery in Sharpeville. The roads are bad. The potholes are a big issue of concern. Whatever little road repairs you are seeing now is being done as an afterthought and as a way to buy our support and elections. We are not being taken seriously,” Enoch Ngubane told The Star.
Another resident, Mokgethi Motsoeneng, echoed Ngubane’s sentiments, saying the time had come to vote for caring leaders who would help the community solve the myriad issues affecting them.
He said these challenges required members of the community to decide on what type of leaders they want.
“To be honest, here in Sharpeville and the Vaal as a whole, no one is taking us seriously. We do not have service delivery. We only see them coming to us on this very day or during elections. As you can see the roads here are bad. The roads are full of water after today’s rain. Some of the streets that used to be tarred are now riddled with potholes and most of them have become gravel roads,” he said.
Tina Mofokeng had this to say: “Service delivery is very poor here. Service delivery only happens once a year and that is on the 21st of March. Beyond that, we have no service delivery to speak off. As you see parts of the road we are standing on is being repaired just because the president is here. Even then, they failed because most of the road is unfinished.”
Speaking on the sidelines of a community visit to the area, Bosa leader Mmusi Maimane said there could be no human rights in South Africa when criminals continued to run rampant.
“There shall be no preservation of human rights while we have a government that allows 83 people to be killed in this country every single day. When we reflect on Sharpeville, 69 people were killed by the police. When we look at today, South Africans do not have the police that protect them from criminals who are killing our people. So when we talk about human rights the right to safety is enshrined in our Constitution and we need a government that will preserve this, but this government is failing,” Mamaine said.
Addressing members of the EFF gathered at the Dhlomo Dam, the EFF’s premier candidate for Gauteng, Mbuyiseni Ndlozi, decried the lack of service delivery in the area.
“The roads have fallen apart in Sedibeng and the potholes here are like swimming pools and our parks are dilapidated, while the golf course has been turned into a centre for criminals and nyaope addicts. Our children are deprived of opportunities and there is no sport that is taking place. All this is because of the corruption of the ANC,” Ndlozi said.
Earlier in the day, ANC President Cyril Ramaphosa addressed a rain-soaked ANC gathering at the Sharpeville Stadium.
“To advance our freedom and in building a true non-racial, non-sexist democratic South Africa, the ANC led a government-established Commission for Gender Equality, the Human Rights Commission and the Commission for the Promotion and Protection of the Rights of Cultural, Religious and Linguistic Communities as institutions to support constitutional democracy. In these areas, a lot has been done since 1994 where the ANC-led government has built houses, provided electricity, potable water, scholar transport, free quality education, social security, sanitation, basic services, road infrastructure and other rights in line with the Freedom Charter and a quest for a better life for all,” Ramaphosa said.
The Star