Msunduzi Mayor Mzimkhulu Thebolla Msunduzi Mayor Mzimkhulu Thebolla, says a clean city will appeal to businesses that will invest money and create more jobs. Picture: Msunduzi Municipality.
Durban - Msunduzi mayor Mzimkhulu Thebolla said it is time for residents of Pietermaritzburg to take full responsibility for the filth in the city by ensuring that they do not litter their surroundings.
He said this when delivering the municipal budget at city hall on Wednesday, where he outlined a number of projects that are aimed at stimulating the local economy and drawing more investors to the KwaZulu-Natal capital.
Thebolla insisted that the city would only appeal to outside investors if it was in a clean state. He lamented how in recent years many parts of Pietermaritzburg had become dumping sites.
“It is a common thing to see a local eating a fruit and then throwing the peels through the window of a moving vehicle, or to have a big van offloading rubbish in an area where they should not,” the mayor said during the sitting.
He told councillors that when people were asked why they dumped rubbish they responded by saying municipal workers would clean it up, and according to the mayor this attitude was the reason that Pietermaritzburg continued to battle with littering.
“Msunduzi’s inner city is the gateway to any part of the city. It is very important that when people arrive in Msunduzi they be impressed by how clean it is. As the municipality we cannot do this alone,” the mayor said.
He highlighted the “adopt a spot” initiative in which role-players such as businesses choose an area that they would continue keeping clean, as one of the measures aimed at returning the KwaZulu-Natal capital city to its former glory.
“Our mission is to inspire all our stakeholders to collectively strive towards keeping our city streets and open spaces clean and to educate communities about the implications of litter to human health,” the mayor stressed.
He called on everyone to play their role in beautifying the city by keeping their surroundings clean.
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