About 20 department of rural development & agrarian reform employees in Mqanduli are worried that their dilapidated and crumbling office building will soon endanger their lives.
The wooden floor in the state building has a huge sink hole, toilets no longer flush and the walls have huge cracks.
But for the 16 employees, most of whom come from far-flung villages, serving the public is still their priority. Some days, workers in the Mqanduli community service centre in the town’s CBD even attend to people outside the dilapidated building.
The provincial department of public works has no lease with the department in its register, according to its spokesperson, Vuyokazi Mbanjwa.
An employee, speaking on condition of anonymity for fear of victimisation, said: “One day a sinkhole just [appeared]. But the building is old — I was still a boy when it started being used as a community service centre and now I am approaching retirement.”
The employee said after the floor broke apart in August, they were told by the department to work from home or work in the field.
“It is hard to work from home because people need services and we cannot go to all of them. We have six cars and deal with people ranging from livestock owners, people who have demarcation problems and those who do gardening.
“We have reported the problems to the department many times before and people have come to inspect the building, but nothing happened. We heard that the department was looking to rent a space for us to work in and we would love that.
“Our lives are at risk — we are worried we may be injured while on duty, but people need services.
“We see more than 50 people a day. We tell people to be careful when they come to the office. We want to work in a safe environment. The floor ripped apart before but was fixed. It has not been maintained for about 15 years now.”
The department was deeply concerned about the health and safety of its employees, MEC Nonkqubela Pieters’s spokesperson, Masiza Mazizi, said.
He said the matter was receiving attention.
“Even during the hard Covid-19 lockdown, the department made arrangements for employees to work from home, and only special circumstances that need contact are attended to.
“The recent risk assessor report [of] 2021 that was commissioned by the department confirms the state of affairs. This all shows that the department is worried about its employees.
“The department in OR Tambo district office advertised for office accommodation twice, with no success. The first time responses were administratively non-compliant; the second time of advertising there were no responses at all.
“The third attempt was to look out for people in the area with accommodation that meets specifications, and one was secured. Another advert was to be issued on Monday, closing on October 10,” Mazizi said.
There is hope, however, as Mbanjwa said her department had plans to build cluster offices.
“This is still in the planning stage. The tender advert is expected to go out early October at an estimated value of R15m to accommodate education, [rural development], Cogta and social development. It is a multiyear project,” she said.
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