Toxic chemical residue from the old UPL warehouse has overflowed into the Ohlange River in Durban once more, just days after government authorities warned the company it faced criminal charges unless it acted swiftly to prevent further water and soil pollution in the area.

In a written directive sent to UPL regional head Marcel Dreyer on 18 October, the Department of Water and Sanitation cautioned that, if convicted, company representatives could be jailed for five years for water pollution offences.

In the directive, titled "Failure to take reasonable measures to contain or prevent a situation which causes pollution of the water resource", senior water regulation official Colin Zwane said he had reasonable grounds for believing that UPL had contravened the provisions of the National Water Act by failing to take adequate steps to prevent pollution.

Zwane said one of the big worries was how to deal with thousands of litres of pesticide-contaminated water currently stored by UPL in a makeshift pollution control dam (PCD) located near the company's fire-gutted warehouse in Cornubia.

Just days after Zwane's warning directive, however, treated and untreated water from this dam started to flow into a nearby stream during heavy rains over the weekend.

The same dam also overflowed into the Ohlange River after heavy rains in April 2022, and now questions are being raised once more on why UPL allowed the dam level to rise to the point where there was a risk of further pollution overflows....