Water is a precious commodity and one that has been taken for granted in South Africa and an impending water crisis has crept up on our country while much of our attention has been dominated by the 17-year energy crisis.
As more and more South Africans are beginning to experience, living without water is far, far worse than electricity outages.
Ask the people living on the South Coast of KwaZulu-Natal what life is like without water for 10 years;
Ask the people of Giyani in Limpopo who are still waiting now 6-year delayed water project;
Ask the people of Makhana in the Eastern Cape who have not had stable water supply for 11 years;
We live in a constitutional democracy that guarantees South Africans both water and electricity and, yet, South Africans have been reduced to become beggars for our constitutional rights for clean water.
For those who have not yet been affected, consider having to buy water to stay hydrated. Imagine not being able to flush toilets or clean your homes and businesses. Think about the healthcare of loved ones who fall ill because of compromised hygiene. See the costs of everything go up as agricultural output declines and business pass on higher costs to consumers.
This is the reality of living in the water crisis that faces our country if we do not act now.
South Africa is a water scarce country that receives uneven levels of rainfall across our country that only amounts to levels half of the average global rainfall. This reality, beyond our control, is compounded by changes in our environment which exacerbate the severity of drought events and threaten our food security.
This means that the margins for error in South Africa are smaller than most other countries in the world and that we have to be efficient in our management of this precious commodity. Unfortunately, the ANC government has failed to act to protect our country from this crisis that was entirely avoidable if it had not been preoccupied with looting our country.
The problem must be understood in 3 parts of the water value chain; Supply, bulk water reticulation to municipalities and municipal management of the water network.
Phase 2 of the Lesotho Highlands Water Project, including the Polihali Dam and transfer tunnel, is 7 years overdue and threatens the security of the entire Integrated Vaal River System which feeds Gauteng, Mpumalanga, the Northern Cape and Free State provinces.
The Department of Water and Sanitation’s capacity to oversee these projects has been at the heart of the delays with over 100 senior engineer vacancies within the Department.
The majority of government water schemes largely used for irrigation and large canal systems are approaching 100 years old and have exceeded the usual lifespan requiring urgent rehabilitation.
New water infrastructure planning is being held back by the closing of many gauging rainfall stations across the country that are vital to measuring rainfall levels that would aid the Department in its new infrastructure rollout.
The failure to expand the capacity of the main arterial pipe reticulation has resulted in the increasing demands being met only through increasing the water pressure. This stop-gap measure only serves to decrease the longevity of the macro water pipe network and increase the number of bursts and leaks that need to be responded to.
The failures of our municipalities are similarly well documented and will be spoken to by our Team Fix SA Member for COGTA, Sello Lediga, and our Gauteng Premier Candidate, Funzi Ngobeni. However, it must be said that the widespread failure of municipalities to renew ageing water networks and to manage ground water contamination is a significant part of the problem.
The approach to addressing the looming national water crisis requires a coordinated approach to municipal water infrastructure. South Africa’s water network will not be able to withstand increasingly serious droughts and dry weather patterns as long as municipalities are losing between 45% – 55% of their water to an increasing number of pipe bursts and leaks of an ageing pipe network.
ActionSA in government following these elections will embark on the following measures to address the water crisis:
– Address the capacity crisis within the Department of Water and Sanitation by filling critical vacancies of engineers and project managers to oversee.
– Repair and expand water infrastructure: ActionSA will improve water-related service delivery by effectively managing South Africa’s water infrastructure. We will collect data on the state of South Africa’s water infrastructure and implement a national strategic maintenance plan to address any risks to South Africa’s water supply.
– Identify leakages in the water system: The excessive amount of drinkable water lost due to leaks in failing infrastructure must be addressed. We will launch a nationwide leak identification programme, requiring all municipalities and bulk water suppliers to conduct projects aimed at identifying water leaks. We will consequently allocate sufficient financial and technical resources to rapidly address water leakages in bulk infrastructure.
– Increase water supply: South Africa’s water supply must keep up with an increasing population and shifting migration trends. ActionSA aims to expand the water supply by using data-driven insights to identify sites to build additional water supply storage. Following the identification of suitable sites, ActionSA will invest in the construction of bulk water supply storage such as dams or reservoirs.
– Invest in technology: We will provide incentives for research in technologies that improve water supply, including the affordable desalination of seawater, resilient infrastructure, and water supply monitoring.
– Reduce water demand: Water is a scarce natural resource in South Africa and wasteful water usage must be reduced. ActionSA will entrench a culture of efficient water use through wide-reaching education and awareness campaigns. We will invest in grey-water distribution systems to ensure that drinkable water is predominantly used for human consumption.
This is precisely why I stand before the South African people today and say that our despair is not without hope. In 41 days from now every South African will have the greatest opportunity in the last 30 years to remove a government that has produced a water crisis that is in our doorstep.
If South Africans want this water crisis solved faster than the 17 years with which our energy crisis has gone unresolved, they need to vote to remove the ANC on 29 May and vote for ActionSA so that decisive and clean government can begin the work to fix our water network.
ActionSA Tables Plan to Fix National Water Crisis
Water is a precious commodity and one that has been taken for granted in South Africa and an impending water crisis has crept up on our country while much of our attention has been dominated by the 17-year energy crisis.
As more and more South Africans are beginning to experience, living without water is far, far worse than electricity outages.
Ask the people living on the South Coast of KwaZulu-Natal what life is like without water for 10 years;
Ask the people of Giyani in Limpopo who are still waiting now 6-year delayed water project;
Ask the people of Makhana in the Eastern Cape who have not had stable water supply for 11 years;
We live in a constitutional democracy that guarantees South Africans both water and electricity and, yet, South Africans have been reduced to become beggars for our constitutional rights for clean water.
For those who have not yet been affected, consider having to buy water to stay hydrated. Imagine not being able to flush toilets or clean your homes and businesses. Think about the healthcare of loved ones who fall ill because of compromised hygiene. See the costs of everything go up as agricultural output declines and business pass on higher costs to consumers.
This is the reality of living in the water crisis that faces our country if we do not act now.
South Africa is a water scarce country that receives uneven levels of rainfall across our country that only amounts to levels half of the average global rainfall. This reality, beyond our control, is compounded by changes in our environment which exacerbate the severity of drought events and threaten our food security.
This means that the margins for error in South Africa are smaller than most other countries in the world and that we have to be efficient in our management of this precious commodity. Unfortunately, the ANC government has failed to act to protect our country from this crisis that was entirely avoidable if it had not been preoccupied with looting our country.
The problem must be understood in 3 parts of the water value chain; Supply, bulk water reticulation to municipalities and municipal management of the water network.
Phase 2 of the Lesotho Highlands Water Project, including the Polihali Dam and transfer tunnel, is 7 years overdue and threatens the security of the entire Integrated Vaal River System which feeds Gauteng, Mpumalanga, the Northern Cape and Free State provinces.
The Department of Water and Sanitation’s capacity to oversee these projects has been at the heart of the delays with over 100 senior engineer vacancies within the Department.
The majority of government water schemes largely used for irrigation and large canal systems are approaching 100 years old and have exceeded the usual lifespan requiring urgent rehabilitation.
New water infrastructure planning is being held back by the closing of many gauging rainfall stations across the country that are vital to measuring rainfall levels that would aid the Department in its new infrastructure rollout.
The failure to expand the capacity of the main arterial pipe reticulation has resulted in the increasing demands being met only through increasing the water pressure. This stop-gap measure only serves to decrease the longevity of the macro water pipe network and increase the number of bursts and leaks that need to be responded to.
The failures of our municipalities are similarly well documented and will be spoken to by our Team Fix SA Member for COGTA, Sello Lediga, and our Gauteng Premier Candidate, Funzi Ngobeni. However, it must be said that the widespread failure of municipalities to renew ageing water networks and to manage ground water contamination is a significant part of the problem.
The approach to addressing the looming national water crisis requires a coordinated approach to municipal water infrastructure. South Africa’s water network will not be able to withstand increasingly serious droughts and dry weather patterns as long as municipalities are losing between 45% – 55% of their water to an increasing number of pipe bursts and leaks of an ageing pipe network.
ActionSA in government following these elections will embark on the following measures to address the water crisis:
– Address the capacity crisis within the Department of Water and Sanitation by filling critical vacancies of engineers and project managers to oversee.
– Repair and expand water infrastructure: ActionSA will improve water-related service delivery by effectively managing South Africa’s water infrastructure. We will collect data on the state of South Africa’s water infrastructure and implement a national strategic maintenance plan to address any risks to South Africa’s water supply.
– Identify leakages in the water system: The excessive amount of drinkable water lost due to leaks in failing infrastructure must be addressed. We will launch a nationwide leak identification programme, requiring all municipalities and bulk water suppliers to conduct projects aimed at identifying water leaks. We will consequently allocate sufficient financial and technical resources to rapidly address water leakages in bulk infrastructure.
– Increase water supply: South Africa’s water supply must keep up with an increasing population and shifting migration trends. ActionSA aims to expand the water supply by using data-driven insights to identify sites to build additional water supply storage. Following the identification of suitable sites, ActionSA will invest in the construction of bulk water supply storage such as dams or reservoirs.
– Invest in technology: We will provide incentives for research in technologies that improve water supply, including the affordable desalination of seawater, resilient infrastructure, and water supply monitoring.
– Reduce water demand: Water is a scarce natural resource in South Africa and wasteful water usage must be reduced. ActionSA will entrench a culture of efficient water use through wide-reaching education and awareness campaigns. We will invest in grey-water distribution systems to ensure that drinkable water is predominantly used for human consumption.
This is precisely why I stand before the South African people today and say that our despair is not without hope. In 41 days from now every South African will have the greatest opportunity in the last 30 years to remove a government that has produced a water crisis that is in our doorstep.
If South Africans want this water crisis solved faster than the 17 years with which our energy crisis has gone unresolved, they need to vote to remove the ANC on 29 May and vote for ActionSA so that decisive and clean government can begin the work to fix our water network.