Government must replace old water systems

It would have been funny had it not been so tragic but it was, at the same time, a metaphor for all that is wrong with this country: While people were protesting outside Johannesburg Water about being without water for weeks, a pipe burst only metres away and sprayed water into the air.

All around us, every day, we see burst water mains and leaking pipes – some of which go unattended for days and waste hundreds of thousands of litres of water.

And then, up jumps our new Water Affairs and Sanitation Minister Senzo Mchunu, to express his concern about how Gauteng as a province is consuming water faster than a drunken sailor sinks booze.

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The minister tut-tutted that South Africa’s average consumption is 233 litres per person per day, while the world average is 173 – but we water wasters in Gauteng devour 300 litres per person per day.

Minister, wake up and smell the chlorine: Mismanagement of Gauteng water resources over the past 28 years by cadre-deployed ANC loyalists means little or no maintenance, or replacement of ageing water service infrastructure has been done.

So, we’re in the position where our dams are overflowing and households have been sitting for weeks without water.

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It is only a matter of time before the weather cycle serves us up a devastating drought, while experts predict South Africa could be out of water by 2030.

So, if we cannot get water to all of our people now, what kind of a catastrophe awaits us around the corner?

This is not to deny, however, that all of us need to work towards a new paradigm of water use and realise that we can’t afford the wasteful ways of the past.

But if we do our job as consumers and conserve, government must do its job and build and repair.

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