Durban - Poor planning and management of resources are among the key factors affecting water supply in municipalities across KwaZulu-Natal.
This was found in the South African Human Rights Commission (SAHRC) KZN Water Inquiry report into the province’s municipalities and water authorities, which stated that residents’ rights had been violated as they had not been provided with clean drinking water.
The inquiry was conducted in response to the current water crisis in KZN, where many have protested and called for action. The commission’s provincial office said it had received more than 600 complaints regarding access to water since 2020.
The commission has given governance entities 12 months to implement its recommendations, failing which further steps will be taken, including litigation, which will be brought before the Constitutional Court in instances where recommendations have been ignored.
It found that there were “systemic failures in water provisioning, and the violation of multiple human rights”.
The commission said complaints it received related to wide-spread water shortages in communities; in some instances, no access to water for more than seven days; inconsistent water supply or water disconnection issues; lack of alternative measures, such as provisioning of water tankers; poor water quality and polluted water.
It noted that demand far outweighed supply capacity, particularly in areas such as uMgungundlovu and eThekwini.
Head of the KZN water inquiry, commissioner Philile Ntuli said municipalities lacked planning and were not addressing ageing infrastructure.
“The impact on rights, livelihoods and dignity of communities is particularly aggravated in impoverished communities and vulnerable households …
“The commission finds the challenges outlined by municipalities and Water Services Authorities (WSA) reflect poor planning and management of resources, particularly with regards to non-revenue water and maintenance of infrastructure.”
The commission said KZN municipalities had been reported to Parliament over the inability to deliver clean water.
SAHRC deputy chairperson Chris Nissen said excuses from the entities ranged from “30 years was not enough to fix the problems”, to old infrastructure and vandalism.
“We also discovered that even when they provided water by tankers to different communities, we found that was also a problem as it was more a business, spending more money on procuring tankers than actually fixing the infrastructure.”
Regarding tanker issues, the panel said it had raised with then Co-operative Governance and Traditional Affairs MEC Sihle Zikalala the unintended consequence of the implementation of the water-tankering system, in the form of emerging corruption, and damage to infrastructure to secure tenders to deliver water.
It said it had found, following testimony received at the inquiry from various municipal entities and members of the public, that there were a number of challenges with the water-tankering system.
“These included inadequate and disproportionate supply to communities; manipulation and commercialisation of the system; the politicisation of the tankering system and possible financial benefit from the system by municipal officials and members of municipal councils.” It called for the emerging corruption relating to the water-tankering system to be addressed and for allegations of damage to infrastructure and manipulation of the tender mechanism to be investigated.
The commission cited eThekwini Municipality, with areas such as Newlands West, oThongathi, Durban, uMlazi and Lamontville experiencing water interruptions on a daily basis.
It recommended that municipalities, including eThekwini and uMgungundlovu District Municipality, “implement appropriate customer-care divisions with a dedicated customer-services team; and institute call-centre mechanisms to receive and refer complaints, with appropriate standard operating procedures to ensure the maintenance of a register of complaints, maximum (six-hour) turn-around time to restore water service delivery and monitoring of resolution of complaints”.
DA provincial leader Francois Rodgers said the findings highlighted the dismal performance by KZN’s ANCrun government.
“Despite crippling issues affecting water provision to millions of people, it has done little to come to their aid.
“The report is particularly damning in its findings on eThekwini. This includes a severe lack of accountability within government and shocking apathy when it comes to the interests of residents.”