After nine months of waiting, staff at Mohlakeng Clinic on the West Rand finally celebrated the replacement of a fluorescent light bulb after a report by The Times.
The light bulb in the clinic's medicine room blew in January. The clinic has not had hot water for a year because of a broken geyser. Air conditioning, heaters and cupboard doors need repairing. Paint on some walls was peeling off.
A chastened infrastructure development MEC, Nandi Mayathula-Khoza, apologised to the portfolio committee on infrastructure development in Gauteng after they visited the clinic last week .
Officials have moved swiftly to fix the problem after The Times reported about the visit on Tuesday.
A relieved nurse said: "You will not believe it. Everything we complained about has been fixed. We are so relieved."
The department of infrastructure development was established in 2009. It is responsible for planning, design, construction and maintenance of provincial government's infrastructure.
In May, it introduced an e-maintenance system, which allows anyone who sees a problem in hospitals to log a call and get it fixed.
After a call is logged, its authenticity is verified and an official is dispatched to inspect the defect. Callers can view the process up to completion.
The same system has been introduced at Leratong Hospital but the backlog of maintenance is still an issue. Of the 2337 calls logged, 42% have not been resolved.
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