Water crisis: DA calls Rand Water, Ekurhuleni Metro to appear before Portfolio Committee
Rand Water need to come clean and explain to the residents of Gauteng why its Eikenhof Pump Station reportedly stopped pumping water due to a power failure.
This is according to Mike Waters MP, DA Lethabong Constituency Head, who said this finding is contradictory to the information Rand Water supplied Parliament.
“Rand Water assured Parliament that they will ensure their pump station will have its own independent power supply per site,” said Waters.
“The current water crisis in Gauteng – especially in the East Rand – could have been avoided had Rand Water implemented the plan they presented to the Portfolio Committee on Water and Sanitation on 25 February 2015.
The Democratic Alliance wants the following answers from Rand Water:
a)Why they have not installed the independent power supply;
b) By which date are they planning on doing so
“Given the crisis that hit Gauteng last year one would have expected Rand Water to implement their own solutions as a matter of urgency.
“In addition it is unacceptable that Ekurhuleni Metro still have not implemented a Telemetry System (a computer system) that would immediately alert them when reservoirs are running low. The days of using sticks to determine water levels are long gone.
“The DA will be requesting that both Rand Water and Ekurhuleni Metro appear before the Portfolio Committee on Water and Sanitation in order to give deadlines as to when:
a) Rand Water will install independent power supplies at all of its pump stations;
b) Ekurhuleni Metro will implement the computerised telemetry system;
c) Their action plan to repair water infrastructure as Ekurhuleni is losing 39.8 per cent of all its water;
d) The reasons why the financial statements submitted to Gauteng Treasury showed that at the end of the 2014/15 financial year in June, the Ekurhuleni Metro had only spent 48 per cent of the R127 million budgeted for waste water management and had failed to spend 46 per cent of the R333 million allocated to water services.
“It is unacceptable that the Ekurhuleni Metro has failed to spend just over R200 million allocated to water and sewerage infrastructure during the previous financial year when the municipality had a water crisis last year and another one is now looming.”
Ekurhuleni plans to build 20 more reservoirs
