DA requests public protector audit of water access

The DA will today request that the Public Protector, Advocate Thuli Madonsela, launch a nation-wide investigatory audit into the state of water infrastructure and access in South Africa.

This is after numerous reports of local water shortages keep pouring in across the country.

” It is heart-breaking that 20 years into our democracy, people still struggle to gain access to water, a basic human right,” said Marti Wenger, DA Shadow Minister of Water and Environmental Affairs.

The DA said that it will request this investigation in terms of section 4 (a)(v) of the Public Protector Act, which states that the Public Protector may investigate an “act or omission by a person in the employ of government at any level, or a person performing a public function, which results in unlawful or improper prejudice to any other person”.

In the past the Minister of Water and Environmental Affairs Edna Molewa, her department and even President Jacob Zuma have claimed that as many as 94.7% South Africans had “access to clean and safe drinking water”.

However, DA said that according to a 2011 general household survey published by Statistics South Africa (StatsSA), only 89.5% of South African households have “access to piped water”.

43.3% had piped water in their homes;

28.6% had access to water in their yards;

2.7% had the use of a neighbour’s tap; and

14.9% had to make use of communal taps.

“One must also bear in mind that, access to a tap does not necessarily mean access to clean or piped water – which is often the case in South Africa. According to the same survey, only 62.1% households surveyed actually rated their water quality as “good” compared to 76.3% in 2005,” said Wenger.

“We cannot sit back and allow incompetent and corrupt officials to continue sapping the state and its citizens dry,” he concluded.