Johannesburg Rated a Filthy City

Recently, Johannesburg, known as “The City of Gold,” received a bad review from Chinese journalists who described the city as filthy. Besides being rated the crime capital of South Africa, the city has declined to a slum status. Overcrowding, filth and unsanitary conditions are coupled with plagues of rats and beggars and the highest rate of unemployed people. Street vendors crowd the pavements selling food, clothing and electronic items. Children, including small babies, strapped to mothers’ backs, tag along through the chaos.

The city is crowded with unemployed people who have nothing better to do than commit petty crimes or start a business selling goods to other desperate people eager to save some money. Vendors cook food on the pavements to sell to hungry people dirt cheap. Flies and the other irritating pests that swarm around the nauseating smell are appalling. The city does not have sufficient public facilities, and the few that do exist are in a dilapidated condition; unhealthy, dirty and foul smelling.

  Criminal elements lurk around the filthy streets, stealing from innocent vendors who sit in the hot sun trying to make a few pennies to feed and support large families. Shops in the central city district have employed additional security to protect the premises from lurking thieves. Steel gates, security cameras and guards patrol the area daily. Pick-pocketing is an art mastered by the young and old alike. Johannesburg’s city center is not a safe place.

Areas adjacent to the city center, such as Hillbrow, once known as the nightlife town;  Yeoville and Berea are no better than the inner center. Further away from the center of Johannesburg, residential suburbs are relatively cleaner and safer, except for several older, established neighborhoods that are overrun by illegal immigrants, drug dealers and prostitution.

The Johannesburg municipality is under the jurisdiction of the African National Congress (ANC) party.  READ THE ENTIRE ARTICLE - PUBLISHED ON THE GUARDIAN LV TODAY - HERE IS THE LINK
http://guardianlv.com/2016/01/johannesburg-rated-filthy-city/

Opinion by Laura Oneale