The Department of Water and Sanitation has established a task team to find ways of providing uninterrupted water supply even during load shedding, according to Minister Senzo Mchunu.
Mchunu was talking to journalists during a media briefing in Rustenburg, after receiving feedback from the task team set up to investigate water supply challenges in the North West Province that affect not only households, but health services and schools alike.
The task team, composed of technical experts from the Department of Water and Sanitation, Magalies Water, Provincial, district and local government, have been having weekly meetings to devise a strategy on how best to provide permanent water and sanitation solutions to the communities across the province.
Minister Mchunu also set up the steering committee, chaired by him and the North West Premier, Bushy Maape, last month, to oversee the implementation of sustainable water and sanitation services in the province.
A Technical Task Team to carry out technical work of assessing, planning and implementation of the interventions for the whole province was also set up.
Mchunu said they have instructed his Director General to constitute a small team that is going to look at the current challenges as a result of Eskom and load shedding, which affects the department’s ability to deliver water, over and above the task team work.
“Municipalities are already dealing with this problem themselves, where they negotiate with Eskom for exemption. The Makwassie Hills is already succeeding in doing so, they no longer have a problem in their pumps and treatment plants, as a result of the exemption.
“We want other municipalities to do the same and we will assist them along those lines but we want this national team of people with expertise to say what are the other alternatives we can try.
“When other municipalities have already bought and provided themselves with generators, but that thing too is a hazard, you need a lot of money for diesel, you need to secure them, wherever they are, it’s a hazard.
“We want to get comprehensive thoughts from the team that the DG is putting together to advise us as to what else needs to be done because it’s an ongoing problem, in some cases you run with a reservoir empty for a number of days.
“We are dealing with that situation outside East London, we have told the mayor there and his people to really sit and say ‘what do we do, do we pump at night, do we inform people, whatever needs to be done’ but at some point you’ve got to stop the pump and fill up the reservoir.
“There’s no miracle that can happen in order to fill up the pump for the people, so they are going to give us feedback today. It’s a practical matter in which they need to apply their minds, but it’s an elephant in the room, it’s a problem, it’s our problem”, said the Minister.
On the issue of bad quality of water in Rustenburg, the Minister acknowledged that the report painted a bad picture about the quality of water in this area but said the department will do everything in its power to fix the problem.
