Cape Town Mayor Dan Plato has promised protesting residents that he will visit their communities to get a clearer picture of their grievances.

Residents of informal settlements in Cape Town, such as Khayelitsha, Philippi and Kraaifontein, demonstrated outside the Cape Town Civic Centre on Thursday while Plato proposed budget adjustments to council members inside.

The protesters demanded, among other things, water and sanitation, electricity and basic services for their areas.

When Plato eventually came out, he promised that he and members of his mayoral executive team would visit the communities.

One resident who lived in Khayelitsha outlined reasons why she would not be voting this year.

“In my South Africa, I have been denied basic services. What is it with this government that we have voted in that has neglected us?” she asked as protesters cheered.

She added: “We go to open fields to relieve ourselves because we have no toilets and we have no water. This makes us easy targets for gangsters, especially at night. Our children do not go to school on some days because of the dirty water around us”.

Another community member from Kraaifontein said councillors were not doing their jobs.

“We have been giving [councillors] our list of grievances, yet they have still done nothing for us.”

The protesters said they were happy that Plato had addressed them and added that they were looking forward to his visit.

In a speech prepared for delivery, Plato, who took over from De Lille in November 2018, said that there had been an increase in service delivery since he took office, with R115m for cleaning up communities and an extra R165m for extra safety measures.

(Source: News24)