“There is no plaque on the statue, only a clumsy painting that looks very unprofessional and our cry is ‘how do you claim to show respect to someone but continue to leave their statue in that state?’”
Fritz told the Dispatch on Friday: “BCM does not follow up with maintaining property, but we will follow this up because nobody is telling us who is responsible for this vandalism.
“There should be cameras at the city hall and security, but the vandalism continues and BCM does nothing,” Fritz said.
BCM spokesperson Samkelo Ngwenya said plans were afoot to fix or replace the statue.
“We finally have an approved budget in place for the project and we are now in the process of going out to contract suitable service providers to restore the statue using material that will not wear away and be vandalised so easily.
“This will mean removing the statue and replacing or upgrading it and we have set time frames to finish this project in this financial year,” he said.
Asked about the security of the city hall, Ngwenya said as a heritage location, the city hall it was among the areas that will benefit from the CCTV cameras that are being installed in the city.
“We are optimistic that this will curb these acts. Over and above this, we have business plans in place towards controlling access within this vicinity,” Ngwenya said.
