Open toilets: DA sends Sexwale results of its country-wide investigation
Minister Tokyo Sexwale's announcement that he is to set up a task team to investigate unenclosed toilets is a welcome development. We hope that it indicates a new willingness to go beyond politics in the interests of those who struggle with substandard sanitation.
This is something that the DA has tackled before. In June 2010, we submitted a report on poor sanitation and open toilets around the country to the South African Human Rights Commission (SAHRC) for investigation. Unfortunately, and inexplicably, the SAHRC declined to investigate on the basis that it "would be beyond the capacity of the Commission to mount an investigation on this scale".
The SAHRC would have been ideally placed to conduct an independent investigation. Nevertheless, we welcome Minister Sexwale's willingness to tackle this head-on. To assist the Minister in locating some incomplete or unenclosed toilets to be fixed, I have sent him the DA's report on open-toilets and poor sanitation around the country.
In our investigation, we found the following examples of unenclosed toilets. We sent this list to the SAHRC with pictures (available on request). It includes:
North West: a series of toilets stand in various degrees of disarray, some without doors, some reduced merely to rubble and other nothing more than an enclosed place to squat, the toilet having been damaged or never put in. A number of them are blocked, overflowing with raw sewerage. When it rains, the blocked toilets overflow further and the sewerage runs into and between houses
eMalahleni, Mpumalanga: The toilets here constitute nothing more than a hole in the ground residents have tried to construct a temporary enclosure because no formal one exists. Elsewhere toilets have no doors and stand open to the public
Ritchie's Community, Northern Cape: Residents have built a semi-permanent and unstable structure around a series of plastic toilets, which, because they have no doors remain open to the public. The toilet itself is a dustbin with a seat on top.
Soshanguve, Gauteng: Over a dozen concrete enclosed toilets stand with doors, open to the public. Close by a single enclosed toilet without door or toilet stands open while raw sewerage flows below creating a muddy marsh land.
Thembisa, Gauteng: A series of un-serviced chemical toilets stand next an informal settlement while raw sewerage flows from beneath them and into running water. Children regularly move through the water .
Codemore squatter camp, KwaZulu-Natal: There is no toilet here, residents defecate in a nearby field which is strewn with toilet paper and human faeces
Cottonlands, KwaZulu-Natal: The base of two toilets stands open in the veld, nothing more than an empty hole on a concrete base
Swapo informal settlement, Ward 29, Msunduzi, KwaZulu-Natal: There are no toilets here. People living there have no choice but to use the nearest tree or bush for some kind of privacy when relieving themselves.
Bedford, Eastern Cape: A plastic toilet stands open, the bricks supposedly for its enclosure scattered around unused.
Moqhaka, Free State: A plastic toilet stands open, next to a street and a concrete base, with no enclosure of any kind.
The DA looks forward to the resolution of an issue that is detrimental to the dignity of so many South Africans. We trust that the Task Team will not play politics with the lives of our people and will conduct an open and honest investigation.
Statement issued by Butch Steyn MP, DA Shadow Minister of Human Settlements, September 7 2011
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