13.04.2026
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KaHhoyi residents stranded as damaged road halts transport

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  • Mpumalanga roads have been severely damaged by heavy rains. kaHhoyi residents say the government has failed them.

Motorists and residents of KaHhoyi village in the Nkomazi area in Mpumalanga have raised concerns about the bad condition of the main road in the village. The road is impassable, and public transport has stopped using the road, forcing commuters to walk long distances to access transport.

Motorists complain that their vehicles are damaged while driving on the road.

The provincial Public Works, Roads and Transport has attributed the delays in repairing the road to rainy weather.

The Mpumalanga Government is accused of incompetence, for allegedly failing to repair a road at the KaHhoyi village, east of Malelane.

The road is in a bad condition. Motorists drive on the side of the road, which is better than driving on the road. The road is riddled with potholes, making it difficult to use.

The residents claim that the road has been in this condition for the past 15 years.

‘The road is affecting us in a very bad way because cars are breaking down. Here, kids are getting ill, and even animals are found in this river,” says a motorist.

“This road is damaging our cars. You fix the suspension today, and tomorrow it’s broken. As you see, this bakkie is a 2025 model. It didn’t reach the ten thousand [kilometres], still on five thousand, 6000km. The car is complaining. So I will be very happy if they can fix this road or put the gravel so that it would be better,” adds another motorist.

A ward councillor, Mafia Fane, says they have written letters to the department, but until now, nothing has happened. Fane says there is no political will to repair the road.

“The road in question has been in this dilapidates conditions for over 15 years it was initially constructed in 2001 and reason why it is in this condition is because even at first it was constructed it was not responding to the conditions, the weather conditions that were prevailing that particular time that’s why you would find storm water on top of the road which led to not leaving bigger much far then what happened we have asked the MEC that we need an urgent innervations at the current moment is not useable, the situation here is unbearable I can tell you that public transport is no longer using this particular road especially during rainy seasons,” says Fane.

Meanwhile, the provincial Public Works, Roads and Transport Department spokesperson, Bongani Dlamini, says plans are underway to repair the road.

“We must also take into account the consultant doesn’t only just seat on front of the computer and to the design there’s tests that need to be done that would determine what kind of the materials that must be used in that particular road, the thing that is delaying is the tests remember around February we had lot of rains around Nkomazi, so some of the tests were unable to be taken so they had to take soil and so that they determine what kind of road that must be constructed because we want at the end of the day to do a quality road,” says Dlamini.

A national state of disaster was declared early this year, after torrential rains and severe flooding claimed lives, displacing many people and damaging infrastructure, which includes roads in Nkomazi and other municipalities in the province.

 

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