R3bn water went down the drain in Gauteng

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While parts of the country have been battling a severe drought for years, municipalities in Gauteng wasted water worth nearly R3billion in just a year. Local governance MEC Uhuru Moiloa made this shocking disclosure in a written response in the Gauteng Legislature yesterday. Moiloa responded to a question by the FF Plus that water totalling nearly R3bn was wasted by the nine municipalities in Gauteng during the 2016/17 financial year. FF Plus MPL Philip van Staden had asked what water wastage in the province had cost taxpayers in that financial year. The City of Joburg topped the list with R1.09bn in water literally going down the drain. This was followed by Ekurhuleni with R787million.

“The water wastage by municipalities in Gauteng is mainly caused by theft and damage to infrastructure, water leakages, burst pipes, leaking reservoirs, blocked sewage systems, poor maintenance and old infrastructure,” Van Staden said.

On Thursday, Statistics SA’s General Household Survey report showed that not everyone had access to water.

Although 88.6% of South African households had access to piped water in 2017, only 74.2% of households in the Eastern Cape, and 74.7% of households in Limpopo had access to water, the report said.

This does, however, represent a substantial improvement from that of 2002 when only 56.1% of households in the Eastern Cape had access to piped water.

Access to water in the dwellings off-site or on-site was most common in Nelson Mandela Bay (100%); the City of Cape Town (99.3%); and the City of Joburg (98.4%), the report stated.

The Western Cape, Northern Cape and Eastern Cape were the hardest hit by the water crisis in the country.

Van Staden said all the municipalities in Gauteng had “wasted a lot of water and there is no distinction to be made between guilty and innocent parties”.

The City of Tshwane wasted water worth R503m, while Emfuleni Municipality stood at R221m,” Moiloa said.

Mogale City wasted R87.7m, Rand West City Municipality cost taxpayers R51.8m, Lesedi Municipality R1.5m, Merafong City Municipality R42m, and Midvaal Municipality R26m.

“The FF Plus is worried about the extent of water wastage in Gauteng and is of the opinion that municipalities need urgent interventions to prevent Gauteng from suffering water shortages in the future, due to the wastage.

“The Gauteng government must put more pressure on the municipalities to ensure that the needless wastage of water is brought to an end and that infrastructure is improved and better maintained,” Van Staden said.

On Wednesday, the DA said it was shocking that Emfuleni had lost water to the value of R121m from July 1, 2017 to December 31, 2017.

“This water has either been stolen or unaccounted for. This water wastage by this municipality is unacceptable, as water is a scarce natural resource that needs to be preserved. These water losses could have been avoided,” said the DA’s Kingsol Chabalala.