DA Delivers: Western Cape exemplifies good waste water management

Note to editors: The water management report by Leon Basson MP, DA Shadow Deputy Minister for Water and Sanitation, can be found here. 

11 March 2016

Water is vital to life. Without water crops wither, livestock perish and people cannot survive. As South Africa faces the worst drought on record it is imperative that we correctly manage this scare resource to ensure that all citizens have sufficient access to quality drinking water.

We simply cannot afford for any water to go to waste. That is why in the Western Cape, the DA government has made a concerted effort to ensure that waste water treatment works (WWTW) are fully functional and well managed.

Through our commitment to managing water correctly we have made significant progress in ensuring that all citizens in the DA-run Western Cape have access to sufficient water, as is guaranteed by Section 27 of the Constitution. In fact, the Western Cape showed the highest proportion of consumer units that benefited from free basic water at 75.7%.

Apart from improving access, it is also important that we make sure that water is safe for consumption. Over the course of last year, DA Shadow Deputy Minister for Water and Sanitation, Leon Basson MP, conducted an extensive oversight visit of South Africa’s WWTW to monitor the state of water treatment. His visit to the newly-constructed WWTW in the DA-run municipality of Malmesbury exemplified how water treatment should be managed.

The WWTW was completed in 2012 at a cost of R113 million and the treatment of the water is of such a high quality that it can be sold to farmers for irrigation. The municipality is also in the process of installing a system whereby electricity can be generated with methane gas, which will mean the WWTW can be taken off the Eskom grid.

In contrast to this, the state of WWTW in ANC-run provinces was found to be dire, posing major health and safety risks, particularly to the poor. Some of the worst examples include:

The Lichtenburg WWTW in the North West, which is non-functioning. Sewage is pumped into the veld next to the Boikhutso Township where children play and people walk every day.

In Cradock in the Eastern Cape, untreated sewage was found to be flowing directly into the Great Fish River.

In Humansdorp, also in the Eastern Cape, the WWTW is non-functional with raw sewage – still containing solids – running through an informal settlement into a neighbouring farmer’s dam.

At Modimolle in Limpopo, toxic waste goes through the WWTW system and straight into the river – this includes condoms, toilet paper, sanitary towels etc.

At Rooiwal in Pretoria, 104.8 million litres of untreated sewage was seen spilling into the Apies River each day. Due to the non-functioning of the sludge plant, sewage sludge is pumped straight onto an adjacent farmland that drains into a large wetland.

In most cases it is the poor who suffer from the ANC’s mismanagement of WWTW, as the poor are disproportionately exposed to untreated water that is not fit for human consumption. This is in violation of Section 24 which states that everyone has the right “to an environment that is not harmful to their health or well-being.”

In 2013 former Minister of Water, Edna Molewa, stated that in South Africa 98% of water in the country is considered “fully allocated”. “[T]his means that my child and your child that is being born tomorrow has 2% of water for use going into the future.” This situation has since worsened.

Water is vital to life and must be protected at all costs. Yet under the ANC we have seen this scare resource entirely mismanaged. The DA is however committed to making progress to ensure that all citizens where it governs have access to clean water. This is progress we seek to extend to more municipalities in the upcoming local government elections.

Statement issued by Kevin Mileham MP, DA Shadow Minister of Cooperative Governance and Traditional Affairs, 11 March 2016