From Jukskei River to Dumping Ground

Once upon a time, right on this property where I sit and type, there once flowed a beautiful, clean river. It's waters was home to fish, ducks, geese and many birds, where residents of old would sit on its banks and have Sunday picnics with friends and family.

There are Strange Things in that Jukskei

It happened around the early 1970's. The mindless dumping. From plastic bags to cardboard boxes to car tyres to cars themselves. Occasionally a domesticated animal floats lifelessly past while rodents the size of cats thrive and breed. And the sewerage. Are you sufficiently depressed yet?


River Cleanups are a Waste of Energy

Every now and then Joburg City in partnership with other organisations and NGO run little week-long campaigns to clean up the river. Even if the campaign lasts 100 weeks, how much difference do you think this makes before its back to square one? Give me a break. The key lies in awareness; not in gumboots and rubber gloves. Save your energy, picking, pulling, carrying to and fro. Think long term and use the funding to train educators.


Education is the Answer

Granted, there is an all-round lack of basic services in Alexandria so residents are inclined to use the river as their dumping ground. And this is where the core issues need to be addressed. It's not about Don't Litter, or Save the River, the fundamental truth is that across the baord, we are a consumerist throw-away society. blindlessly striving towards the great American Dream in some way or another. If we were only to shift our perspective on how to begin to solve the atrocities of past and present sins, then by all means, pull those carcasses out of the river, but more urgently, address the root of the problem, and the answer to the problem lies in educating the 3 R's, Reduce, Reuse, Recycle.


Apathy for the Environment is Punishable by Death

But basic services and the lack thereof cannot be the excuse for everyone. Here's one example: There is a house with peeling pink paint that stands on the banks of the Jukskei in a Northern suburb of Johannesburg. Every so often a man carries a pile of rubbish down from his house and throws the rubbish into the river. In the Winter months when the water level is low and the river flows slowly, the rubbish merely tumbles down the side of the bank, accumulating as the weeks go by, until eventually the man sets the pile alight and a tower of blue-grey smoke rises into the atmosphere. True story.

We are extremely good at conjuring excuses up for our laziness. This did not occur in a township but in a suburb of Sandton, where refuse removal is the weekly norm, where a recycling centre is but 10 minutes away, and gardens are big enough for a substantial compost heap. So, give me a break and don't try and plead poverty either.


SOUL Angels on the Horizon

I shall not be boring you with the long and winded 10-year old story with the City of Joburg, Metro police, City Parks, River Rangers and the like. Instead, I will be leaving you with the knowledge that there is a glimmer of hope on the rippling water of the Jukskei in the form of WET Africa, and SOUL Foundation. Watch this space.