Water, Sewage & Effluent January February 2019 | Page 41

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An example of delayed investments in additional supply infrastructure could be seen in
Hammanskraal, where water was dirty because the treatment works were hopelessly
under capacity.
Water Sewage & Effluent January/February 2019
41
innovations
Despite spending R2.2-billion on a supply project for the 55 villages around Giyani in
Limpopo, the villages are still without a reliable supply of water.
newspapers, that infrastructure often
does not work. The case of the 55
villages around Giyani in Limpopo is
famous. Despite spending R2.2-billion
on a supply project, the villages are still
without a reliable supply of water. A year
ago, DWS reported that, although 96%
of South Africans had access to basic
infrastructure, only 65% had access to
reliable services.
The Giyani case is attributed to
corruption and the Special Investigation
Unit is reported to be closing in on the
culprits. But it would be wrong to assume
that corruption is the main cause of
supply interruptions. In Krugersdorp,
a combination of power failures and
pipe breakages led to days of dry taps.
In Rustenburg, Rand Water reduced
supplies because they were exceeding
their allowed abstraction from the Vaal.
Supplies to Matjhabeng Local
Municipality, which includes large
towns like Welkom and Virginia,
were cut off for a few days because
the municipality did not pay its bulk
provider. When the municipality went to
Mike Muller is a visiting adjunct
professor at the Wits School of
Governance. A former DG of Water
Affairs and commissioner of the
National Planning Commission,
he now advises on water and
development matters as a member
of the Strategic Advisory Group
of the UN’s Joint Monitoring
Programme for the water supply
and sanitation components of SDG6.
how bad things are today. The DWS
initiative to publish an annual Blue Drop
report assessing the state of municipal
water management would have provided
the perfect instrument to monitor South
Africa’s SDG performance. Unfortunately,
former Minister Nomvula Mokonyane
stopped publishing the report in 2014.
Cynics noted that the two-year delay in
publishing the final report was probably
because of an 8% drop in drinking water
quality between 2012 and 2014.
These are not new problems. In
2014, Cabinet gave the DWS the target
of providing a cohesive plan and a
coherent approach to ensure 90%
reliable water supply services by 2019.
Since then, reliability has been steadily
deteriorating.
All this raises serious questions.
Cape Town decided not to interrupt
water supplies at night because of
court to protest, they explained that they
simply did not have the money to pay.
Meanwhile Cape Town faced its ‘Day
Zero’ of cuts because the supply system
did not have enough capacity in the face
of a severe drought. That was, in part,
because they had delayed investments
in additional supply infrastructure.
Similarly, water in Hammanskraal was
dirty because the treatment works were
hopelessly under capacity.
These stories add up to a very gloomy
picture that is summarised by StatsSA,
our official statistical agency. The 2017
Household Survey published by StatsSA
last year showed that around 50% of
households in Limpopo and Mpumalanga
suffered serious interruptions. For the
country as a whole, the figure was over
20%, and it has been getting worse.
In addition, water quality has been
declining. Unfortunately, we do not know