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Subject: Municipalities delaying roll-out of free water - Dwaf

http://www.engineeringnews.co.za

Published: 2006/11/28
Author: Matthew Hill
Portfolio: Online Staff Writer
E-mail: newsdesk@engineeringnews.co.za

Municipalities were seen to be the major obstacle preventing the estimated 40% of South Africa's population from receiving government's allocation of 6 000 l of free water to each household, as they were held back by a lack of capacity and a poor understanding of how to implement government's plan, the Department of Water Affairs and Forestry (Dwaf) said on Tuesday.

The serious issue here was that the municipalities in poor, rural communities had showed the slowest progress, and these catered for the people that needed the free water the most, Dwaf national resources deputy director-general Dr Cornelius Ruiters said, speaking in an exclusive interview with Engineering News Online, on the sidelines of the Africa Water Congress 2006 conference, in Sandton.

The provinces that were particularly slow in rolling out government's free basic utilities programme were Kwazulu-Natal and the Eastern Cape, he said.

Government had taken the decision that all South African's should receive free basic utilities, including water, sanitation and electricity, up to a specified usage level.

Ruiters said that the process to provide the 6 000 l of free water to every household in the country started in 2001, and that currently over 60% of South African citizens had access to the service, adding that some 80% of municipalities had implemented it.

“We have a serious problem with municipalities implementing the programme,” he stated. “The National Treasury has made the funding available to provide the free water, but many municipalities lack the capacity and understanding to interpret what is required of them.”

However, he said that Dwaf was working “flat-out” with the Department of Provincial and Local Government in assisting the municipalities to roll the programme out, as well as identifying where bottlenecks could be.

“By the next fiscal year, we hope to make sure that all municipalities are implementing the plan,” stressed Ruiters

Morné Viljoen

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