Multi-million rand Matatiele sports centre still unfinished after six years
But the municipality says the project is on track to being completed
Construction of the Matatiele sports centre started in 2028 and is yet to be finished. Photos: Nombulelo Damba-Hendrik
- Construction of the multi-million-rand Matatiele sports centre in the Eastern Cape started in 2018 and is still not finished.
- The first contractor left the site in 2019.
- A new contractor was appointed in 2023.
- The municipality says more than R35-million has been spent so far, but residents nearby say no workers have been on site since April.
Six years after work started on the Matatiele sports centre in the Eastern Cape, more than R37-million has been spent, but the centre is still not complete.
Construction of the centre started in October 2018 and was to be finished in December 2021. But the contractor, Isivivana construction, hired to do the first phase of the project, left the site in 2019, leaving only a fence and some grass.
A new contractor, MVI Construction and Maintenance was appointed on 19 May 2023, according to the municipality’s tender document. The contractor was to build change rooms with toilets, grandstands and a guard house, and lay asphalt along the running track.
According to Matatiele Local Municipality spokesman Luncedo Walaza, approximately R23-million was spent on phase one of the project. And so far an amount of R12.2-million had been spent for phase two.
Asked about the current status of the project, Walaza said the contractors had built the guard house and change rooms and installed steel for the stands. He said the project is within its timeframes, but did not respond to questions about when the centre will be finished.
But residents who live around the site say they haven’t seen workers there since April.
Despite several calls and messages over two weeks, GroundUp has not been able to reach MVI Construction and Maintenance for comment.
The Matatiele Local Municipality has spent millions of rand on this sports centre that has been under construction for 6 years.
GroundUp visited the site twice last month and saw that a new guard house had been built, and poles had been erected for the stands which are yet to be built. We saw no construction workers at the site.
Resident Viwe Khwababa says his brother was employed in 2019 to do the fencing in the first phase of the project. “They were only paid R2,500 each. They waited thinking that the company would give them another task but that did not happen. Our municipal manager then went on national television to tell the whole country that the stadium will be finished in December 2021, but we are still waiting,” she said.
Another resident, Simthembile Nogwaza, says construction re-started late last year and workers left the site in April.
“My brother works there. Some months he would work the whole month, the next they only worked for two or three weeks, until they were told to go home in April and wait to be called. He was told that the municipality will pay in July and they will return to work in August,” he said.
DA ward councillor Wonga Potwana said he had tried to question the municipality about the budget for the sport centre but had yet to get a proper answer.
“This is an old project. It was supposed to be done in one phase, not two. The second phase came after there were questions about the funds spent and little was done after so many years.”
Matatiele Local Municipality spokesman Luncedo Walaza asked GroundUp to clarify that the contractor for Phase I completed the following:
"• Site Establishment
• Bulk Excavation (Cut)
• Disposal of Spoil Material
• Embankment Filling to Platform Level
• Construction of Selected Layers of Platform
• Constriction of Storm Water Drainage System
• Construction of Manholes, Sub- Soil Drainage system for both Football Pitch and Running
Track
• Construction of Clear Vu Fencing and Gate for the site
• Construction of G5 Subbase Layer for football and Running Track
• Installation of Kerbing around the football pitch and Running Track -
• Construction of G2 Base Layer for football and Running Track
• Concrete V-Drain"
Letters
Dear Editor
I travel past this so-called sports field on a weekly basis and I have not seen any progress for months.
I would like Mr Gayton McKenzie our Sports and Culture minister to come and investigate this site. I would not be surprised if he called for an investigation into this waste of R54-million which could have gone to the poorer schools in this area. Schools that have to use ground between the main road to Kokstad and local housing boundaries. Six years for probably a one-year project...
Come on Mr McKenzie we need someone with a voice to listen to us. The kids need you to step up to the plate.
© 2024 GroundUp. This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.
You may republish this article, so long as you credit the authors and GroundUp, and do not change the text. Please include a link back to the original article.
We put an invisible pixel in the article so that we can count traffic to republishers. All analytics tools are solely on our servers. We do not give our logs to any third party. Logs are deleted after two weeks. We do not use any IP address identifying information except to count regional traffic. We are solely interested in counting hits, not tracking users. If you republish, please do not delete the invisible pixel.