A-G flags R2.3bn drain by water tankers as maintenance collapses across municipalities

More than 20% of South Africa's 257 municipalities spent around R2.32 billion on water tankering services in the 2023/24 financial year, with R420 million of that classified as irregular expenditure.

A damning audit conducted by the Auditor General of South Africa (AGSA) has revealed profound shortcomings in the management of the country’s water resources across 59 municipalities.

The AGSA's Water Sector Report outlines a grim picture for Water Service Authorities (WSAs), who reported an astounding R14.89bn in water losses for the 2023-2024 year, attributed largely to inadequate maintenance of infrastructure.

Briefing Parliament on Tuesday, AGSA officials warned of a steady deterioration in wastewater treatment, driven by poor water management and weak demand management systems.

They reported that 90% of wastewater treatment works failed at least one quality standard, signalling a growing threat to the environment and public health.

Infrastructure development has also stalled across the sector. National water entities recorded an average delay of 62 months on projects. At water boards, seven projects were delayed by an average of 64 months, while water service authorities experienced average delays of 25 months.

"This has a significant impact on the environment and the water sources in the disposal process. We had also identified that there has been pollution from untreated wastewater harms ecosystems, which impact health and drinking water quality," said Jolene Pillay, a senior manager at the office of the AG. 

"We noted that due to the impact that a lack of maintenance has on the reliability of supply, a lot of the water service authorities are using water tankers to provide this essential service." 

The AGSA report said water service authorities spent on average only 3% of the value of their property, plant and equipment on repairs and maintenance, which was below the benchmark that had been set of 8%.

At the Department of Water and Sanitation, operating as a Water Trading Entity (WTE), only 39% of planned maintenance was actually carried out.

It noted that 30 water service authorities, nine of which are in the Northern Cape, did not have any water maintenance plans and no evidence was provided to confirm the existence of plans at four water service authorities.

"And in respect of non-compliance with environmental law, we noted that there were no maintenance plans for wastewater infrastructure at all of the 13 water service authorities where procedures were performed," Pillay said.

"On the no drop reports, water conservation and demand management is not effectively implemented. The WSAs did not submit information at 24 water authorities and 46 WSAs that were rated as critical failed to provide information on their water balance detail.

"Most of the WSA in the Northern Cape, Free State and Mpumalanga lacked evidence of consumer meter replacement programme and availability of skills to implement this strategy was a concern at 74 WSA assessed as poor critical." 

Concerns were also raised about poor management of leak response resources at 83 WSAs, while 60 out of 64 main WSAs failed to submit action plans.

The AGSA further identified six material irregularities at the Department of Water and Sanitation, amounting to R433m in financial losses. Two of these irregularities caused substantial harm to the public. The AGSA noted that R46.9m of the losses is currently in the process of being recovered.

Responding to the findings, MP Visvin Reddy described the statistics as alarming.

"What the report revealed is quite shocking to say the least. 46% of available drinking water systems are unsafe. Then we are told 44% failed chemical safety, that means the water out of the taps may poison you," Reddy said.

"We are also told by the AG that 99% of water treatment plants are failing in this country. R14.9bn is lost every year to leaks and municipalities are spending over R2bn on water tankers. Infastructure projects are delayed on average by 32 months.

"This is disgraceful. I believe after hearing this we cannot just leave here. This requires a focused campaign to take each of these items and hold officials and water boards accountable because the lives of our people are at stake here." 

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