Durban — Water and Sanitation Minister Senzo Mchunu has called for an improvement to eThekwini’s water and sanitation services.
Mchunu called on different stakeholders to expedite the improvement of water and sanitation infrastructure in eThekwini.
The minister’s call follows a stakeholder engagement meeting with Cooperative Governance and Traditional Affairs (Cogta) Minister Dr Nkosazana Dlamini Zuma, KwaZulu-Natal Cogta MEC Sihle Zikalala, eThekwini Mayor Mxolisi Kaunda, Umgeni Water and other stakeholders in eThekwini to discuss interventions to water and sanitation challenges faced by the metro.
Mchunu was in KZN for the weekend to meet with various stakeholders from all three spheres of government, water entities and water service authorities to assess the progress of projects being undertaken in the province, and to discuss ways to address the state of water and sanitation provision.
Mchunu said: “Collectively here, we need to find a mechanism to deal with the challenges the city is currently faced with. We need to start embracing collaborations and partnerships with the private sector as soon as possible as a new way of dealing with service delivery because depending only on fiscus alone, it will take us years to adequately address these problems.”
Mchunu recommended the establishment of a strong technical team that would enable the municipality to work with other role players to carry out the work.
“The importance of partnership is very crucial because all of us have to work together to enhance the provision of services to the people of eThekwini,” Mchunu said.
“The establishment of a technical team is also equally important to assist in identifying sources of money, allocate specific timelines to the projects, and deliver within those timelines. The technical team should be service delivery oriented and will work with various other stakeholders to determine a way forward in addressing issues of infrastructure in the municipality.”
Mchunu said that following the floods, substantial progress in the assessment in eThekwini had been made by the department since last year, and it had been established that there was a need to strengthen the capacity of the municipality to address the concerns of poor infrastructure and to ensure equitable access to water.
Funding for infrastructure was said to be the main critical issue at the meeting, and it was recommended that funding and the implementation of infrastructure investment should be prioritised.
“Funding is an enabler and makes things happen, and as DWS we need to come up with a model that will encourage partnership with the public sector. With the establishment of a technical team there will also be engagements with Treasury to iron out issues of funding,” Mchunu said.
The minister said there were masses of people without access to water in the municipality and the narrative must change. He added that the department was concerned about the state of the infrastructure that had caused pollution to the rivers of eThekwini Municipality.
Kaunda reiterated the call to facilitate funding with various stakeholders and private entities.
“We will be working with various stakeholders to ensure that funding is secured for infrastructure development in eThekwini. We are also planning to accelerate this process by signing a Memorandum of Understanding with the Department of Water and Sanitation,” Kaunda said.
Zikalala implored the City to prioritise the issue of non-revenue water which was also the main point of contention in eThekwini Munipality.
Non-revenue water in the City is high at 57%. Only 40% of the water that is purchased is billed and of that less than 70% is paid. A factor contributing to high non-revenue water is +80 000 customers that are illegally connected to the water network as well as leaks.
Recently, ActionSA in eThekwini reported that the eThekwini Municipality lost R5 million a day due to water leaks.
In a statement, eThekwini ActionSA caucus leader Alan Beesley said the party noted with great concern the water losses experienced by the municipality, reaching up to an astounding 56% of all tap water it buys – mostly from leaks and water theft, which costs eThekwini close to R5m a day.
He said the municipality continued to lose an estimated 615 million litres of water daily.
Meanwhile, Kaunda announced that a budget of more than R250m had been allocated to repair sewer infrastructure.
“We are pleased to report that the municipality has finalised this process and a budget of over R250m has been set aside to repair sewer infrastructure. For instance, a contractor has already started to repair Ohlange sewer pump station which is responsible for the contamination of Ohlange River and uMhlanga Beach. Work is also under way to procure additional pumps and generators, particularly to pump stations located along the coast,” Kaunda said.
Daily News