Fed-up businessman dumps broken traffic lights outside municipal offices to highlight crumbling infrastructure

When Kariega businessman Jevon Dyer loaded about five broken traffic lights on a trailer before offloading them outside the Nelson Mandela Bay Municipality’s customer care office, he wanted officials to confront what residents had been living with for months.

Dyer’s “protest” comes while the municipality has effectively halted repairs to many vandalised traffic lights, saying criminals repeatedly strip them of electricity cables soon after they are fixed.

Addressing a roads and transport committee meeting on Thursday, political head for roads and transport Yolisa Pali-Jongilanga said the city could no longer justify repeatedly repairing the same traffic lights because they were vandalised within weeks, warning that the repeated expenditure had also become an audit risk.

For Dyer, however, the broken traffic lights scattered across Kariega are the result of years of deteriorating municipal services and a metro buckling under the pressure of keeping basic infrastructure such as traffic lights functioning.

Dyer, who has owned businesses in Kariega for more than two decades, said the protest was about more than faulty traffic signals.

“It’s just become too much. ... things are unmaintained. It just gets worse,” he said.

Born and raised in the town, Dyer remembers a very different Kariega.

“This was like a little hub. We used to walk in the streets at night. Every pole had Christmas lights on it throughout the year,” said Dyer, who has since earned himself the moniker Mr Robot.

Today, Dyer says the Kariega he grew up in – once affectionately known as the Garden Town – is almost unrecognisable, describing it as resembling a war zone after years of neglect and failing municipal services.

“It looks like we’re in a war. It looks like a hurricane came through the town and we never recovered.

“Over the years, it’s just deteriorated. Business owners have closed up shop and left. I’m one of the last ones standing, and I refuse to pack up,” he said.

A drive through Kariega suggests his frustration is shared by many residents and motorists.

Traffic lights at several intersections are kaput. Some poles have been stripped of electrical cables, while others lie on traffic islands after being knocked over or vandalised.

Outside Dyer’s shop in Caledon Street, the traffic lights have been out of operation for months.

He says he has seen several accidents and near misses at the intersection.

The idea of taking the damaged traffic lights to the municipal offices came to Dyer while he was making a delivery elsewhere in town.

Someone jokingly suggested they should load the broken traffic lights on to a trailer and leave them at the municipal offices.

“I thought, why not? I was just tired,” Dyer said, adding that his wife had also expressed concern about the safety of driving around Kariega.

About a week after the traffic lights were delivered, they were still lying outside the municipal customer care offices when Daily Maverick visited Kariega.

Dyer has lamented the poor conditions of Kariega, partially blaming it on the deterioration the town is undergoing.

“Over the years, the town and the conditions have just deteriorated. And all the business owners have closed up shop and left. I’m one of the last ones standing, and I refuse to pack up. I do not want to pack up.

“Business has gone down. No one’s investing in Uitenhage anymore.

“Unfortunately there’s so many holes to fill, and you can’t do them all at the same time. This is why I am trying to be part of the solution and not the problem,” he said.

Dyer said there had been an exceptional outpouring of support from the public. “The support has been there … the people want change and they’re behind me. People just do not want more problems,” he said.

At Thursday’s committee meeting, Pali-Jongilanga said: “We cannot afford to continuously repair the same traffic lights every three months due to repeated acts of vandalism. We have been warned by the National Treasury that this will be flagged during the audit process as it will seem like we are stealing the funds for the repairs. It almost seems as though we are feeding the thieves each time we do repairs,” she said.

“These vandals are not your regular criminals; they seem coordinated. Judging from the manner they steal the cables, it looks like they are trained and know what they are doing. They know how to deal with live electricity cables. Something is fishy and needs to be investigated.”

Pali-Jongilanga said that on the M17, traffic lights were stripped seven weeks after being repaired.

“Our people are going to suffer because traffic light dysfunction leads to accidents and congestion on the roads.”

In September 2025, Freedom Front Plus councillor Bill Harington submitted a motion proposing that the city recover the cost of repairing traffic lights damaged in crashes from the negligent drivers or their insurers.

The motion was supported by then acting city manager Ted Pillay. However, Harington told Daily Maverick on 16 July 2026 that, despite the motion having been approved, it appears not to have been implemented.

“The reason why it is not being implemented is because there is the constant revolving door of city managers. Ted Pillay made big promises that the matter would be implemented, only for him to leave the municipality two weeks later.

“The matter is not being implemented because it all comes down to executive directors that need to enforce these things. It went through the council, but metro police are clearly not implementing it,” Harington said. The municipality did not respond to questions from Daily Maverick sent on Wednesday morning. DM