eThekwini Councillor Sharmaine Sewshanker peers into a pool of sewage outside a Durban Hotel. The hotel is bearing the effects of a technical failure experienced at the municipality’s Mahatma Gandhi Pump Station near Point.
A Durban hotel manager said his guests were greeted by a massive hole filled with sewage and an unbearable stench, and the eThekwini Municipality's response to repairs has left him disgusted.
The hotel bears the effects of a technical failure experienced at the municipality’s Mahatma Gandhi Pump Station, near the Point area. The technical failure has also caused some beaches to close, and has enraged the sailing fraternity based at the local harbour.
For more than a week, sewer water overflowed from pipelines onto parts of Margaret Mncadi Avenue (previously known as Victoria Embankment) and into the harbour.
The manager, who cannot be named to protect the identity of the hotel, said the problems with the sewer pipelines outside his business have been ongoing, but in March 2026, two sinkholes formed outside his fence, exposing cables and raw sewage flowing underground.
