Human Waste Flows Through the Streets of Hout Bay

• Sewage spills in Imizamo Yethu are increasingly becoming a serious problem.
• It forced the local Hout Bay Snipers Basketball Club to stop training at the public facility for their safety.
• Residents say they are concerned that they are facing a health emergency and that the City is not treating the matter with urgency.
• Greywater from Imizamo Yethu flows down the hill, polluting the Disa River.
• The City has said that it is “investigating long-term solutions to tackle pollution in waterways in the area” and will assess maintenance needed at the basketball facility.

For years the community of Imizamo Yethu in Hout Bay has battled continuous sewage spills, turning the local basketball court into a foul-smelling pool of human faeces.

Residents we spoke to say they are worried about the health risks. In Imizamo Yethu, residents can often be found jumping over streams of overflowing sewage from erupted manholes and stormwater drains. Some people have constructed makeshift walkways from their doorsteps to the road to cross over the streams of sewage.

The community’s Hout Bay Snipers Basketball Club was forced to stop playing at the community basketball courts, as it became unusable due to the frequent sewage spills.

Bryn Mbulawa, founder and coach of the basketball club, said the problem has been ongoing for about nine years. He said sewage from the surrounding blocked manholes and ablution facilities frequently flows onto the basketball court, making it impossible for them to play and host games. Mbulawa coaches about 70 children.

Bryn Mbulawa, founder and coach of the Hout Bay Snipers Basketball Club, and Hout Bay resident Andrew Davey. The basketball club has had to stop training at the public courts due to frequent overflowing raw sewage on the courts.

He said they made the tough decision to close the basketball court in May, but he still catches some children playing there because there is nowhere else to shoot hoops.

“This is the only place we know. This was our safe area, our happy area,” he said. “But even if you put a stop to it, you can’t take the kids out, they always want to hoop. Even if you tell them they’re going to get sick, ten minutes after you leave, they’re back there again.”

Similarly, Hout Bay resident Andrew Davey said that he fears this could result in a “health emergency” in the area if the City fails to find a permanent solution to the sewage overflows.

“The sewage system is ageing. It’s undersized, and with the burgeoning community, the system is basically crashing … The whole system has to be upgraded,” he said.

The City, in a letter to residents on 20 May, stated that there are several causes for the recurring sewer blockages and overflows in the area. Densification and population growth has “increased wastewater volumes significantly, adding pressure on the sewer system across Hout Bay,” the City said.

Loyiso Skoti, chairperson of the Imizamo Yethu Development Forum, says their conditions get worse in winter during heavy rainfall.

“Stormwater to sewer cross connections” are channeling household greywater away from stormwater. The City said this was implemented to lessen the pollution impact on nearby water sources. But it is now unfortunately also increasing sewer volumes, increasing pressure on the network, the City added.

The City also blamed dumping of foreign objects, litter, and household waste in the sewer and “illegal informal dwelling connections to the sewer system”.

The long-term plan is a “potential upgrade” to the sewer pipe running on the eastern boundary of the Disa River. The funding for the feasibility phase of the upgrade is expected to be available in the 2028/29 financial year.

But Mbulawa says this plan is too far in the future and worries the City isn’t dealing with the problem with “urgency”.

Rivers of sewage

Sewage and greywater overflowing in the streets and outside homes has become a daily reality for Imizamo Yethu residents.

Most of this flows down into the nearby Disa River, which eventually flows into the ocean at Hout Bay beach.

Greywater flows via the stormwater system from Imizamo Yethu into the Disa river. The Disa river flows into Hout Bay beach.

Gary Krweqe, Imizamo Yethu community leader, said residents report the overflows, but officials take a long time fix them. “The unfortunate part is that we just have to live with it,” he said.

Krweqe, who says he has lived in Imizamo Yethu for about 30 years, said the population has grown significantly since then, with little to no infrastructure upgrades to accommodate the community’s growing needs.

Loyiso Skoti, chairperson of the Imizamo Yethu Development Forum, said they have previously raised the issue of the strained and ageing stormwater system to no avail. The issue is worse in winter during heavy rainfall.

Skoti said that the conditions were not good for the health of the community.

According to a City report, water quality of the river “deteriorated significantly in the middle to lower reaches”, areas that are mostly residential and include Imizamo Yethu. Most of the contamination is from “inflows of untreated sewage from the Imizamo Yethu informal settlement into the stormwater network and sewer overflows as a result of blocked pipes, exacerbated by significantly reduced river flows during summer”.

The City of Cape Town says that sewer blockages are caused by foreign objects and household waste ending up in the sewage systems.

Long-term plan

The City’s Mayco member for Water and Sanitation, Zahid Badroodien, told GroundUp the Disa River is an urban river and “therefore it is generally highly polluted due to a variety of contributing factors”. Pollution sources include “large amounts of waste from informality where people are not connected to infrastructure, all the storm water that drains into the river, lots of residents in the area (both formal and informal), as well as domestic animals and horses”.

The City and the Hout Bay Rivers Catchment Forum have been working on a comprehensive study “investigating long-term solutions to tackle pollution in waterways in the area”. As a result, they developed the Hout Bay Pollution Abatement Strategy and Action Plan.

The City also pointed us to a statement from December 2024 addressing the issue of foreign objects causing blockages and mechanical failure at the Disa River Pump Station, which lead to sewage overflows.

The City added that the maintenance requirements at recreation facilities which include the basketball court, are an “ongoing challenge”.

The City also said an assessment will be done of the basketball facility to determine what maintenance is required.

Imizamo Yethu, a township in Hout Bay, has grown substantially over the past couple of decades, putting strain on the ageing sewerage system.

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