CPT welcomes SAHRC’s ruling on sanitation services
Jaimie-faith Poonah
06 March 2015
The City of Cape Town has welcomed the ruling by the
South African Human Rights Commission on the sanitation services the city
provides to informal settlement.
The Social Justice Coalition
conducted a week-long audit on non-flush toilets in four settlements in Cape Town .
Fieldworkers audited 256
toilets and interviewed residents about their experiences and found that half
the toilets were in an unusable condition.
The city appealed against a
decision by the provincial HRC last year on the matter and now the SAHRC has
upheld the appeal.
Mayor Patricia de Lille Spokesperson Zara Nicholson said in
the provincial HRC made a number of allegations regarding on how the City of
Cape Town provides sanitation services. Further more it has conducted
investigations into the complaint which was originally laid by the social SJC
in a manner that was procedurally improper.
Nicholson said the city
disputed the findings immediately inlight of the fact that as a metro authority
where as a nation leading record of sanitation provision for all areas of the
city, including informal settlements. While we
respect the role of chapter 9 institution we might be allowed to participate in
their work in a manner that is free from prejudice.
Meanwhile the Social Justice
Coalition has challenged the Mayor Patricia de Lille and her lawyers to
experience the daily indignity and insecurity of using a toilet in the city.
SJC’s Axolile Notywala said
the Mayor’s statement that the city has been vindicated by the outcome of the
appeal to the commission is false and misleading.
Notywala said that is exactly
the opposite of what the decision of appeal of the HRC report was saying; there
was many saying that these procedural issues with the report and that it must
be sent back to the Western Cape
provincial office to be reinvestigated.
"We are saying
that the issues are still there, the issues of the lack of proper sanitation
services are still there in informal settlements" Notywala added.
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