R30 million agri-hub stands gutted as farmers watch hope fade

“Security guards are guarding nothing”

In Moripe Gardens, just outside Siyabuswa, there’s a facility that was once meant to change lives.

Today, it stands hollow.

The R30 million agricultural hub under the Dr JS Moroka Local Municipality has been stripped to its bones machinery gone, water tanks torched, pipes ripped out, and borehole equipment vanished. Yet the municipality continues to pay for four private security guards per shift to protect what residents now call “walls and memories.”

It’s a bitter irony in a province where farming is not just business, it’s survival.

A project once championed at the highest level

The Dr JS Moroka Fresh Produce Market was one of the late David Mabuza’s flagship rural development projects during his time as Mpumalanga premier.

The vision was bold: create an agri-hub that would serve both commercial and small-scale farmers, linking them to the Mpumalanga International Fresh Produce Market and opening doors to local and even international distribution.

For farmers in the area, many battling high unemployment and limited market access, it represented something rare: structured opportunity.

But from the beginning, the project stumbled.

Construction first began in August 2010, only to grind to a halt a month later because of a land dispute. Work resumed in 2013, but the contractor was dismissed for poor performance. Another was appointed in 2015 with a R14 million budget and a September completion deadline only to be terminated again. A third contractor came on board for an additional R6 million.

Residents say the facility was eventually completed around 2020, with adjacent agricultural infrastructure following in later years.

And then, almost as quickly, it began falling apart.

Stripped bare, despite round-the-clock security

Walking through the site now is like stepping into an abandoned shell.

At least nine water tanks are gone. Five 2 500-litre JoJo tanks were reportedly set alight where they stood. Electrical fittings have been torn from bathrooms. Irrigation pipes have been ripped from the ground. Crop protection structures have collapsed, their steel supports stolen.

Even the borehole equipment has disappeared.

All this happened while the municipality paid for four security guards per shift, 24 hours a day.

According to residents, the guards themselves have become victims. Armed criminals allegedly overpowered them recently, tying them up and assaulting them in search of copper cables. The guards carry batons and a one-way radio. The thieves carry guns.

The site is fenced with palisade, but gaping holes make entry effortless.

“Criminals walk in and out,” one passerby said. “What exactly are the guards guarding?”

Millions gone and more questions than answers

Local resident Thulani Sihlangu says the community watched the decline in disbelief.

“Everything has been stolen, all that is left is the walls,” he said. “A cold room worth millions was installed and stolen within a week.”

He and others believe money disappeared in phases, alongside infrastructure.

The situation has drawn comparisons to another troubled project in Mpumalanga. DA MPL Bosman Grobler pointed to a similar agri-hub initiative in Mkhondo Local Municipality, where at least R142 million was reportedly spent yet the facility remains incomplete more than a decade later.

For rural communities, these projects were not vanity builds. They were meant to formalise farming operations, provide packaging facilities, and create reliable collection points so farmers could reach bigger markets.

Instead, many farmers are back to selling informally or struggling to transport produce long distances at their own cost.

A community that needed this

Traditional leader Madolo III Mahlangu says farming is a lifeline in Dr JS Moroka.

With unemployment rates painfully high, small-scale agriculture keeps many families afloat.

The agri-hub, he believes, would have improved livelihoods across the municipality.

“What we hope for is a resolution to this saga and get the facility working,” he said.

For now, however, there are no clear answers.

When approached for comment, municipal spokesperson Mmasabata Ramatsetse acknowledged receipt of questions but did not provide further clarity on the project’s future.

The bigger picture: rural promises vs rural reality

Across South Africa, agri-hubs have often been presented as catalysts for rural economic revival, linking emerging farmers to formal markets and reducing post-harvest losses.

But when governance falters, infrastructure becomes vulnerable.

In communities like Moripe Gardens, the frustration runs deeper than broken buildings. It’s about opportunity lost. It’s about young people who might have found work. It’s about farmers who believed, briefly, that government investment would translate into tangible support.

Instead, there’s a shell of a building, guarded around the clock ,with nothing left inside to protect.

And in rural Mpumalanga, that silence speaks volumes.

{Source: The Citizen}

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