GEORGE NEWS - The anger that hop farmer Timothy McDonald felt when he found several black bags full of household trash dumped on his farm last week, turned to disbelief. For upon rummaging through it, he discovered personal post belonging to that of George town councillor Theuns Botha, who is spokesperson for the DA.

He telephoned the George Herald to voice his dismay. The irony of the affair was not lost on him as it so happens Botha holds the environmental affairs portfolio for the DA and he serves on the municipality’s environmental affairs committee.
This much was evident from an agenda found in the trash belonging to Botha and his wife Aretha, former model agency boss.
Upon enquiry, a highly embarrassed Botha told the George Herald that an employee negated his instructions to dump the black bags at the municipal refuse site for recycling after clearing the content out of his office.
Instead the erring driver took his bakkie and its contents elsewhere. The McDonalds found it on Monday at the start of the Montagu Pass on a site that borders their farm.

Nocturnal activities
According to Botha, the spot is notorious for clandestine meetings between couples or prostitutes and their clients who stop there especially at night for some nocturnal activities. The locals know it as ‘Kyk vir die Apie’. Botha said: "You almost had two stories, one about an employee being murdered on the spot for disregarding instructions and one about illegal dumping of trash."

Botha phoned back on Monday to inform the George Herald that he had instructed his employee to take his bakkie and pick up the trash and clean up the area.

The McDonald family, who has been farming hop for two generations, told the George Herald that it was perturbing that people thought so lightly of their environment. This was not the first time they found personal trash in these circumstances. At weekends people often come to remove huge quantities of pebbles from the river, not realising that this was disturbing the delicate balance and causing massive erosion. The stones stabilise the riverbanks.

Article and photo: Pauline Lourens