As the seasons shift and the nights grow colder, our commitment to the precinct remains heated. April was a month of significant infrastructure hurdles, but also of pioneering wins that set Unity in Community apart from the rest of Durban. If you havent noticed our area is outperforming in our turnaround while adjacent areas are still in decline we are fighting back to arrest the decay. As we have rolled up our sleeves and taken on the challenge, we need your participation. It takes 2 to tango.

💡 The Bright Side: Major Wins

• Illumination: We’ve gone from 90+ non-functional streetlights to just 4 remaining repairs. Our streets are ready for the winter dark.
• Roads & Maintenance: Sarnia Road painting (Wakesleigh to Woodlands) is complete. We are now pushing for the extension to Stella Road. Our Children, motorists and residents are far safer now. Sarnia was the priority but all our roads within the precint need some attention.
• The "Dry" Streak: For the first time in 8 months, we had zero bursts at Leaky Limber or Rocky Ridge. We are monitoring this closely; three more leaks will trigger a mandatory PVC pipe replacement after feasibility studies, which we initiated in January 2026.
• The Middleton Miracle: A major leak that ran for years—wasting millions of gallons of fresh water—was finally fixed saving the community and eThekwini millions of rands. We can safely say that we are not the leakiest suburb in Durban.

⚠️ April Challenges & Accountability

• Sanitation & Stormwater: Extreme rain caused infrastructure failure in Ducasse Park, affecting Challinor and Dickens Roads. We are demanding consequence management for poor previous repairs.
• Billing & Metro Issues: Ethekwini billing remains late. Councillor Samantha is assisting residents in her office to address these concerns directly.
• Verge Cutting & Trees: Verges were cut, but tree trimming is lagging. We are pushing Area Based Management for a "blitz" to clear encroaching branches.
• Refuse: Fleet breakdowns caused two disruptions this month. We are holding CSW accountable for next-day recovery and nothing less.
• Low water pressure affecting Angle and Dickens road, so far we have only recieved 4 formal complaints, we are unable to push this on the basis of only 4 complaints. If you are affected please email us on escalations@unityincommunity.org.za

🚀 Innovation: The Residents’ Dashboard

As promised, we have officially launched our own reporting platform (Software)—a first-of-its-kind transparency tool in the country. After months of hard work, late nights ,coffee driven coding sessions, we have launched version 1 and are ironing out some of the bugs with any new system. This is the first Community Resource planning tool in South Africa for sharing information between Residents and the Municipality.

• View the Data here in real-time so you can see the Faults logged or our Community: Residents Dashboard
• Accountability: Every director in every department in eThekwini now has access to the Ethekwini Accountability Dashboard. We are bringing transparency to performance, and we won't stop ruffling feathers until results improve. https://www.unityincommunity.org.za/ethekwini-accountability-dashboard/. Currently, Parks and Recreation is the worst-performing department with a 97.2-day response and only a 14% closure rate. Water Management and Electricity are our top performers. We are now reporting back to the Presidential Ethekwini Working Group on this data and how we can improve collaboration and accountability.
• Action: If your fault isn't on our dashboard, we aren't aware of it. Log your faults and email reference numbers to escalations@unityincommunity.org.za. with a description so we can assist you.

🗳️ Looking to the Future: Local Government Elections

President Ramaphosa has announced that Local Government Elections will be held on 4 November 2026.

Now that a date is set, we must ramp up our expectations of political leadership. We urge you to:

1. Register to vote: Ensure your voice can be heard.
2. Policy over Personality: Pay close attention to actual plans and track records rather than rhetoric.
3. Real Questions: Every candidate for our ward will be given an opportunity to provide real answers to this community. We want leaders who can walk the talk at both city and ward levels.
4. Ensure you understand that you are also voting for a new Mayor, and a ward councillor and having competent leadership is imperative if we are to ensure continued service delivery or even better.

🗓️ May & June Outlook

• Current Load: 35 faults remain open while 45 were closed last month. Once the 4 remaining streetlights have been fixed we will be turning our attention to the day burning. i.e the lights that remain on during the day.
• Potholes: All roads needing tarring have been assigned to Ethekwini teams. Check the dashboard to see if your street is on the list. If not please log the fault and escalate to us.
• Community Hubs: We are fighting to restore the Scouts Hall for community use and are against the facility being used for anything else than a community hall. It was at our request that the condemnation be removed and the building be repaired after years of neglect. We stood firm and after almost 6 months of perservering with the Problems Building Division, Parks and recreation is now restoring the hall. Its not if or maybe but when public consultation is requested everyone needs to be involved in how this facility is used. It was our vision for it to be used by the community for the community.
• We are working with Hillary Malvern Cricket Club to revitalize their facilities. We have written to KZN cricket for a partnership to assist with pitch preparation and to the city to resurface the road to the field, cut the grass in the car park and field, and to restore the lighting so the club can play day/night games. However it also means that our avid walkers and runners can exercise in Safety after hours. Again we will request this until it is accomplished.

A Note to Our Members: Our resources are limited and prioritized for group members only. We cannot assist residents who are not on the group or other areas like Seaview, Malvern or other Parts of Mount Vernon due to our limited resources. If you are an admin in another area we are however happy to share what we have learnt. We are volunteers doing our best. As we celebrate Workers Day, take a moment to thank your admins for the work behind the scenes. Your feedback inspires us to keep pushing despite the challenges.

*Just a quick note on how we work with the municipality so we’re all on the same page. As the Admin Team, we are not in a position to “police” the municipality or force them to act. Our role is to log issues, communicate directly with the relevant departments, and follow up consistently on your behalf. Once an issue is reported, we do push for feedback and resolution. But timelines, delays, breakdowns, and resource issues are unfortunately out of our control. If a task isn’t completed, we’ll keep pushing and look for alternative ways to get it resolved. As long as we have the correct info from you, we will do the necessary follow-ups. We ask for your patience and understanding, as some matters do take time. Before you post in the Group, consider your words now having this understanding. Lets shift from complaining to solutions.Thank you for working with us to build unity in our community.

Bronwynne, Sarah, Vishal, Nomasonto, Wayne, our Dedicated Street Captains and Volunteers. - April 2026