– Residents had to source a tyre before the municipality could fix an overflowing sewer.
– Years of DA warnings have gone unheeded as the sewage and service delivery crisis deepens.
– Modimolle-Mookgophong’s financial and governance collapse is now translating directly into broken equipment and failing basic services.
The Democratic Alliance (DA) is concerned by the continued collapse of service delivery in the ANC-led Modimolle-Mookgophong Municipality, where residents at Jasnia Flats in Ward 11 had to source a tyre before municipal workers could repair a sewer that had been overflowing for months. The incident exposes how financial and governance failure is now translating directly into broken equipment and failing basic services.
When the municipality eventually undertook to attend to the problem on 24 August, its sanitation team could not proceed because the municipal jet truck had a damaged rear tyre and no spare.
With the assistance of DA Ward 11 municipal election candidate Janine Erasmus, a tyre had to be sourced privately from the community simply to enable municipal employees to do their work.
Once the sewer line was excavated, a broken pipe and fittings were identified and repaired. Yet another equipment breakdown then prevented the excavation from being closed and the work from being fully completed.
This is not an isolated incident.
As far back as April 2024, DA oversight identified five persistently overflowing manholes in Ward 11, including in Joe Slovo Street. In October 2025, the DA escalated continuing sewage failures in the ward to the South African Human Rights Commission.
Earlier this year, more than 6,200 Modimolle-Mookgophong residents supported a DA service-delivery petition demanding action on sewage spills, overflowing sewer pipes and deteriorating municipal infrastructure.
Yet the failures continue.
In July, the DA warned that the ANC-led Modimolle-Mookgophong Municipality had adopted an unfunded budget, carried approximately R1.6 billion in debt and had a debt-collection rate of only 52%.
These financial and governance failures under the ANC eventually become service-delivery failures: vehicles that cannot operate, infrastructure that is not maintained, and residents waiting months for basic services.
The DA’s Local Government Manifesto commits DA governments to reversing this cycle through preventative maintenance, professional municipal administrations and ensuring that public money is ringfenced and directed towards the infrastructure and services residents depend on.
Municipalities must maintain infrastructure before it fails and ensure that the vehicles and equipment required to deliver basic services are operational.
The DA will follow up on the completion of the Jasnia repair and seek clarity on the operational condition and maintenance of the municipality’s sanitation vehicles and equipment.
Residents should not have to supply a tyre before their municipality can fix a sewer.
When local government works, the basics work.