By AGISANANG SCUFF
9 July 2025- The Minister of Water and Sanitation, Pemmy Majodina said municipalities are responsible for reticulation and ensuring that water reaches the homes of residents. Majodina who tabled the departmental budget today in Parliament said, it is important for government officials to understand the value chain of water provision so that they can properly guide members of the community, whenever issues of water are raised in their constituencies.
She further said in his State of the Nation Address (SONA) delivered on 6 February 2025, President Cyril Ramaphosa said: “An urgent priority is to ensure a secure and reliable supply of water across the country. Many people in our cities, towns and villages are experiencing more and more frequent water shortages as a result of failing water infrastructure.
“It is impossible to live without water and it is impossible for the economy to grow without water.”
Majodina said Ramaphosa declared water as an immediate crisis and made a firm and unequivocal commitment for the government to take a series of decisive actions to resolve the water crisis. She further said perhaps at this point, they must restate the point that as a national department, they are responsible for bulk water supply and water resources.
“You will recall that we held a Water and Sanitation Indaba on 27 and 28 March 2025, which was attended by delegates from national government and national 2 entities, provincial government, the municipalities which are water services authorities, SALGA, the private sector, and water and sanitation experts.
“The Indaba unanimously agreed on a set of practical resolutions related to delivery or implementation models. There are five pillars identified such as increasing investment through financing options, ensuring the financial viability of the sector, enhancing and strengthening technical and operational capacity and efficiency,” said Majodina.
She added that this includes building partnerships through building water sensitive and resilient communities and fighting criminality and corruption in the water and sanitation sector.
“The Infrastructure Fund which was established by Ramaphosa has been assisting the department to put in place such blended finance projects. Secondly, we identified a need to diversify the water mix and increasingly make use of other sources of water, including increased sustainable use of groundwater, seawater desalination, and water reuse.
“In this regard, the department is providing funding for groundwater projects through its grants in many different municipalities, including in the Dr Ruth Segomotsi Mompati District Municipality in the North West, Oudtshoorn Local Municipality in the Western Cape, Dikgatlong Local Municipality in the Northern Cape and Thaba Chweu in the Free State,” she said.
Majodina said in addition, their Water Partnerships Office is assisting various water services authorities to put in place partnerships with the private sector for waste water reuse projects, including for the Umhloti, Umkomaas, Northern and Kwa-Mashu wastewater treatment works in eThekwini. She said this includes the Olifantsfontein and Waterval waste water treatment works in Ekurhuleni, the Rooiwal waste water treatment works in Tshwane; the Sebokeng waste water treatment works in Emfuleni, the Pelsvale waste water treatment works in Rand West City, the waste water treatment works in Outeniqua and the waste water treatment works in George.
“More municipalities are starting to develop seawater desalination projects, including Overstrand, Saldanha Bay and the City of Cape Town in the Western Cape, the City of eThekwini in KZN, and Ndlambe municipality in the Eastern Cape.
“Thirdly, we made an undertaking to continue to monitor the implementation of more effective water conservation and demand management programmes to bring our water consumption per capita levels in line with, or below, the international average, and to ensure that industries use water as sparingly as possible,” said Majodina.
The Guardian 