Andile Moshoeshoe
HARRY Gwala District Municipality mayor Zamo Nxumalo has vowed to take decisive action against contractors who fail to complete projects within agreed timeframes. He warned that poor performance will no longer be allowed to undermine service delivery and leave communities waiting for essential services.
Nxumalo issued the warning during an oversight visit to water and sanitation projects across the district, undertaken as part of the municipality’s ongoing efforts to monitor implementation, identify delays and accelerate service delivery.
One of the projects inspected was the Creighton Abstraction and Treatment Works project linked to the bulk water supply scheme under the Dr Nkosazana Dlamini Zuma Local Municipality. During the visit, Nxumalo expressed concern over what he described as the painfully slow pace of construction, raising questions about the progress achieved since the municipality’s previous inspection.
He said the work completed so far appeared limited, with visible progress largely confined to the installation of tiles and the clearing of trees, activities that, in his view, fell short of what should have been achieved by this stage of the project.
Nxumalo said the municipality was increasingly frustrated by contractors whose failure to fulfil their contractual obligations forced the government to terminate their appointments, sometimes leaving the municipality vulnerable to accusations of unfairly targeting businesses.
“It is deeply frustrating that, as a municipality, we sometimes have to terminate contracts with companies that are not performing, only for it to appear as though we are victimising them. The reality is that these contractors are failing to deliver on the work they committed themselves to completing,” he said.
The mayor said the municipality had deliberately moved away from relying solely on office-based assessments, opting instead to visit project sites to establish whether contractors were delivering on their promises.
He stressed that delays in water infrastructure projects had consequences beyond missed construction deadlines, directly affecting communities whose access to reliable water supplies depended on the timely completion of these schemes.
The mayor also highlighted concerns surrounding the Shayamoya Reservoir, indicating that the municipality would conduct a physical inspection after identifying signs that the project was not progressing as expected.
Nxumalo said the municipality could not afford to overlook delays in infrastructure that was needed to improve access to water, particularly when communities continued to depend on the government to address their basic needs.
The planned inspection of the Shayamoya Reservoir forms part of the municipality’s broader oversight efforts to establish the extent of delays, assess implementation challenges and determine what corrective measures may be necessary.
