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Water Services Fault Lines
An Assessment of South Africa’s Water and Sanitation Provision across 15 Municipalities
Introduction
Centre for Applied
Legal Studies (CALS),
Johannesburg
Centre on Housing Rights and
Evictions (COHRE), Geneva
Norwegian Centre for Human
Rights (NCHR), Oslo*
Kate Tissington Marc Dettmann Malcolm Langford Jackie Dugard Sonkita Conteh
Water Services Fault Lines
An Assessment of South Africa’s Water and Sanitation Provision across 15 Municipalities
October 2008
* The views expressed in this publication are those of Malcolm Langford of the South Africa Programme and not necessarily of the NCHR
i
Water Services Fault Lines
Sonkita Conteh is a legal officer for the Right to
Water Programme at the Centre on Housing Rights
and Evictions (COHRE), based in the Accra office.
Marc Dettmann is a Marquette University graduate
from the United States, who volunteered at the Centre
for Applied Legal Studies (CALS) between August
2007 and August 2008.
Jackie Dugard is a human rights activist and senior
researcher at CALS, working on access to basic
services and courts.
Malcolm Langford is a Research Fellow in the South
Africa Programme at the Norwegian Centre for
Human Rights (NCHR) in Oslo.
Kate Tissington is a researcher at CALS and
COHRE, focussing on housing rights and evictions,
as well as water and sanitation services.
About the
Contributors
ii
Acronyms & Abbreviations
ANC African National Congress
CDW Community Development Worker
CSIR Council for Scientific and Industrial Research
DLA Department of Land Affairs
DoH Department of Health
DPLG Department of Provincial and Local Government
DPW Department of Public Works
DWAF Department of Water Affairs and Forestry
ES Equitable Share
FBSan Free Basic Sanitation
FBS Free Basic Services
FBW Free Basic Water
FBWSTT Free Basic Water and Sanitation Task Team
ID Identity Document
IDP Integrated Development Plan
kl kilolitre (a thousand litres)
lcd litres per capita (person) per day
PAJA Promotion of Administrative Justice Act
MIG Municipal Infrastructure Grant
NJRT National Joint Response Team
OECD Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development
O/M Operations and Maintenance
PPM Prepayment or Prepaid Meter
RDP Reconstruction and Development Programme
REDs Regional Electricity Distributors
SALGA South African Local Government Association
SANS 241 South African National Standard 241 Drinking Water Specification
SMIF Special Municipal Infrastructure Fund
Stats SA Statistics South Africa
VIP Ventilated Improved Pit Latrine
WDM Water Demand Management
WQMS Water Quality Management System
WSA Water Services Authority
WSDP Water Services Development Plan
WS NIS Water Services National Information System
WSP Water Services Provider
Acronyms &
Abbreviations
iii
Water Services Fault Lines
List of Key Legislation and Regulations
Constitution of the Republic of South Africa Act
108 of 1996 (Constitution)
Local Government: Municipal Structures Act
117 of 1998 (Municipal Structures Act)
Local Government: Municipal Systems Act 32 of
2000 (Municipal Systems Act)
National Water Act 36 of 1998
Norms and Standards in Respect of Tariffs
for Water Services (20 July 2001) (Norms and
Standards)
Promotion of Administrative Justice Act 3 of
2000 (PAJA)
Regulations relating to Compulsory National
Standards and Measures to Conserve Water (8
June 2001) (Compulsory National Standards)
Water Services Act 108 of 1997 (Water Services
Act)
List of Key Policy Documents
DPLG, “Framework for a Municipal Indigent
Policy” Draft (September 2005)
DPLG, “Guidelines for the Implementation of
the National Indigent Policy by Municipalities”
Draft Document 1 (November 2005)
(Guidelines)
DPLG, “Policy Framework for the
Implementation of the Municipal Infrastructure
Grant (MIG)” (5 February 2004) (Policy
Framework)
DWAF, “Draft White Paper on Water Services”
(October 2002)
DWAF, “Free Basic Water Implementation
Strategy” (August 2002) (FBW Implementation
Strategy)
DWAF, “National Water Services Regulation
Strategy” Penultimate Draft (April 2008)
(National Water Services Regulation Strategy)
DWAF, “Strategic Framework for Water
Services: Water is life, sanitation is dignity”
(September 2003) (Strategic Framework)
DWAF, “Water Supply and Sanitation Policy
White Paper” (November 1994)
DWAF, “White Paper on a National Water
Policy for South Africa” (April 1997)
DWAF, “White Paper on Basic Household
Sanitation” (September 2001)
List of Key
Legislation, Regulations & Policy Documents
iv
table
of contents
About the Contributors ii
Acronyms and Abbreviations iii
List of Key Legislation and Regulations iv
List of Key Policy Documents iv
Executive Summary 2
ONE Introduction 8
TWO Methodology 10
THREE Legal and Policy Framework for Water Services in South Africa 12
FOUR Key Concepts in Water Services Provision 15
4.1. Water Services Authorities (WSAs) and Water Services Providers (WSPs) 15
4.2. DWAF as the Water Services National Regulator 15
4.3. The Section 78 Assessment Process 17
4.4. Municipal Infrastructure Grant (MIG) 18
4.5. Local Government Equitable Share (ES) 18
4.6. Free Basic Water (FBW) and Free Basic Sanitation (FBSan) 19
4.7. Tariff Policy 21
4.8. Indigent Policy 24
FIVE Fault Lines 25
5.1. Eliminating Backlogs and Improving Levels of Service 25
5.2. Free Basic Services (FBS) 31
5.3. Indigent Policy as the FBS Targeting Mechanism 34
5.4. Tariffs 40
5.5. Credit Control Enforcement - Water Disconnections and Restriction Devices 50
5.6. Financial and Technical Assistance 57
5.7. Water Quality 61
5.8. Water Demand Management (WDM) 65
5.9. Public Participation 68
SIX Conclusion and Recommendations 72
SEVEN Appendices 74
1
Water Services Fault Lines
South Africa. The nine fault lines identified and
elaborated on in this report are:
Eliminating Backlogs and Improving Levels of
Service
Free Basic Services (FBS)
Indigent Policy as the FBS Targeting Mechanism
Tariffs
Credit Control Enforcement – Water
Disconnections and Restriction Devices
Financial and Technical Assistance
Water Quality
Water Demand Management (WDM)
Public Participation
Eliminating Backlogs and
Improving Levels of Service
Eliminating backlogs, meaning extending water
services to those with none, and improving levels of
service, meaning providing increasingly better levels
of service to those with rudimentary access, are vital
aspects of water services provision across South Africa.
The latter objective is required by the Constitution
which requires the progressive realisation of the
right of access to sufficient water within available
resources. Notwithstanding an obvious problem with
the accuracy of data, it is evident that, fourteen years
after the advent of democracy, there are still many
people – mostly in rural areas – who still have to rely
on rivers for their water supply and buckets as a form
of sanitation. At current rates, the Department of
Water Affairs and Forestry (DWAF) estimates that
backlogs in water will only be eliminated in 2011 and
backlogs in sanitation will only be eliminated in 2031.
Even these figures appear optimistic for a number of
municipalities in this survey, and many discrepancies
in backlog figures were revealed in our investigation.
Executive
Summary
South Africa has one of the most progressive
legislative and policy frameworks for water services
in the world, which includes a constitutional right to
water and a national Free Basic Water policy. Within
this framework, water is conceived of as a social good
and a vital part of the broader developmental project.
However, as highlighted in this report, when it comes
to implementation at the local government level,
where water services are located, the reality is quite
different.
The reasons are diverse but key among them is that,
having devolved the responsibility for water services
delivery to local government in 2000, national
government has steadily decreased financial and
technical support. All the while, municipalities are
under considerable pressure, in terms both of internal
accounting mechanisms and national government
fiscal oversight, to become financially self-sufficient
and to recover service-related costs from all areas,
including poor communities. This means that at the
municipal level it is cost-recovery, rather than social
or developmental benefit, that largely determines
water services delivery. At the same time, this
report demonstrates that political will at the local
level is important, manifesting in variances between
municipalities with similar levels of resources. As
a consequence of this decentralised and largely
unregulated model, water services delivery is very
uneven. While progress has been made in some areas,
for many South Africans access to sufficient water
and sanitation remains a pipedream.
This report presents the findings of a survey of water
services across 15 municipalities conducted by the
Centre for Applied Legal Studies (CALS), the Centre
on Housing Rights and Evictions (COHRE) and the
Norwegian Centre for Human Rights (NCHR),
between November 2007 and July 2008. The research
findings are presented as a set of nine cross-cutting
‘fault lines’, which reflect systemic obstacles to the
provision of universal access to water services across
2
Executive Summary
Moreover, there is a large group of people, such as
those living in informal settlements, who are stuck at
the bottom of the ‘water ladder’ with only rudimentary
water services and no progressive realisation of water-
related rights. Numerous informal settlements
have been connected with a basic water supply and
sanitation facility within 200 metres, but they must
wait for slum upgrading and housing programmes to
materialise before they can have water in the yard or
home. Yet many housing and upgrading programmes
are stalled or have not yet commenced. In the case
of sanitation, it is arguable that the ‘ladder’ has been
shortened. There is a strong emphasis on providing
Ventilated Improved Pit (VIP) and dry toilets instead
of water-borne sanitation, even though these options
have not turned out to be necessarily more affordable
in practice.
This fault line is both the most challenging and the
easiest to conclude: There is a clear and urgent need
to provide everyone with access to sufficient and
appropriate water and sanitation provision. Ensuring
adequate access to water services promotes human
development and health and contributes to freeing
the social and economic potential of every person. It
also advances gender equality because, in the absence
of adequate water services, women bear the burden of
fetching and carrying water from rivers. There can be
no more pressing priority for South Africa, suggesting
that all resources, financial and technical, should be
focused on eradicating water services backlogs and
improving levels of service.
Free Basic Services (FBS)
At present FBS – Free Basic Water (FBW) and
Free Basic Sanitation (FBSan) - are provided in
an ad hoc manner by municipalities, with widely
varying compliance with national standards. Some
municipalities do not supply FBS at all and some
supply only the minimum FBW amount without
any FBSan. The lack of any real national monitoring
or enforcement of the implementation of DWAF’s
FBW policy at the local level, as well as the absence
of a FBSan policy, is highly problematic. There is
clearly an urgent need for DWAF to formulate a
FBSan policy and to monitor and enforce it. Linked
to the goals of eradicating backlogs and improving
levels of service, such a policy should determine what
kinds of sanitation services are deemed appropriate
for particular environments and municipalities should
be encouraged to provide the best possible sanitation
services with the best possible FBSan.
In relation to FBW, DWAF needs to follow up on
claims made in its 2002 FBW Implementation Strategy
to identify and provide the highest level of support to
those municipalities that could not implement the
national FBW policy by July 2003. This was over five
years ago and yet in some municipalities poor people
still cannot access even the minimal FBW amount.
While national policy is in place, there is as yet no
clear enforcement of the policy or national assistance
to implement at the local level.
There is also a need for DWAF to oversee and, if
necessary, assist municipalities to move away from
the very minimal amounts of FBW, towards a more
internationally recognised standard. International
experts, as well as DWAF itself, have all confirmed
that 50 litres per person per day is the minimum amount
of water needed to sustain a healthy and dignified
life. In order to ensure that household allocation of
water corresponds with household size, a housing
size census should be undertaken every couple of
years. Furthermore, there should be non-burdensome
special representation mechanisms in place, advertised
widely, for input in the interim period as well as for
3
Water Services Fault Lines
4
of ensuring that all deserving people receive the critical
benefit of FBS, but it has the additional benefit of not
requiring complicated processes and administration
to identify qualifying households from non-qualifying
households. Universal allocation has a further benefit of
countermanding the otherwise negative segmentation
of water services (whereby water services become
stratified, with rich and poor households receiving
fundamentally different services). In South African
municipalities, universal allocation could be effected
through an appropriate amount of water calculated per
person per day (starting at 50 litres per person per day
but incorporating an additional amount for sanitation
where there is water-borne sanitation) worked out
across a suburb’s average number of persons per
household. In municipalities with richer water users,
universal targeting could be afforded through steep
tariffs at the luxury end of the water services spectrum,
ensuring that those who use excessive amounts of
water and can afford to pay, cross-subsidise the poor.
In uniformly poor municipalities cross-subsidies
would have to come from national government.
Tariffs
The setting of tariffs should be an exercise in striking an
appropriate balance between providing affordable water
and sanitation services, and ensuring the sustainability (in
economic and environmental terms) of rendering such
services. Every municipality’s tariff structures should
be based on and reflect this logic. However, such logic
was not evident across the municipalities in our survey,
which reflected widely varying tariff rates for similar-
situated resource bases and population profiles.
The glaring disparity across the current tariff
landscape is cause for concern, suggesting a role for
greater national standardisation, albeit ensuring local
appropriateness. The first step would be for DWAF
to assist municipalities to determine (a) the actual
costs of providing water and sanitation services, (b)
how much revenue they are receiving from these
services, (c) how much poor households can afford to
vulnerable groups like people living with HIV/AIDS.
Finally, access to FBS should not be linked to the
compulsory installation of water restriction devices
that limit access to water to unacceptable amounts or
in unacceptable ways.
Indigent Policy as the FBS
Targeting Mechanism
The majority of municipalities in our survey provide
FBS only to those households that are registered
for their indigent policy. Using the indigent policy
as a means of allocating FBS to poor households is
deeply flawed and generally fails to achieve the desired
poverty-alleviation ends since the poor are under-
represented on the register. The most vulnerable
societal groupings (women, child-headed households,
and the unemployed), are frequently not aware of the
indigent policy or register and/or do not register for
fear of attracting adverse official attention. The process
for qualifying also differs vastly across municipalities,
suggesting incoherent objectives and methodologies,
and is typically quite onerous and exclusionary.
An alternative method of providing FBS to those
in need is that of geographic targeting. Geographic
targeting entails identifying poor areas for the allocation
of FBS. It requires municipalities to seek out those
who do not qualify, as opposed to placing the onus and
burden on those who do qualify to register with the
municipality. In South Africa, this method is quite
attractive as apartheid geography segregating racial
groups is still largely present. A greater allocation of
FBW could thus be automatically allocated to known
areas of poverty, including certain buildings in the
inner city. In order to avoid rich people in these areas
benefitting unfairly, efforts could be focused at weeding
out undeserving recipients. However, geographic
targeting is less workable though in municipalities
with overwhelmingly poor populations.
The most ideal method of allocating FBS, and one
that makes more sense in overwhelmingly poor
municipalities, as well as generally, is that of universal
allocation. Regardless of type of municipality,
universal allocation is not only the most effective way
5
Executive Summary
spend on water and sanitation services and (d) how
many richer users exist and how much they can afford
to pay to cross-subsidise poorer users (this involves
studies of elasticity of demand of rich water users i.e.
at what charge will high-end users start to decrease
their water consumption). Another recommendation
is for DWAF to monitor water and sanitation tariffs
in a similar manner to which it monitors water quality,
with an obvious emphasis on accuracy, efficiency,
enforcement and equity. Accurate data on tariffs is vital
to assist with studies into implementing progressive
and affordable tariff structures.
Credit Control Enforcement
– Water Disconnections and
Restriction Devices
Excessive emphasis on cost-recovery encourages
strict credit control enforcement for non-payment
by the poor. Although more research is needed to
confirm this, there appears to be a worrying trend to
impose harsh credit control measures on low-income
residents, while higher-income residents, businesses
and government departments are afforded far more
leniency in terms of non-payment of accounts. One
municipality bucked the trend and only threatened
large users with disconnection. But the more general
practice is that, while government institutions (and
high-end domestic users not canvassed in this research)
get away with using water on credit and not paying
bills, poor water users are frequently disconnected
or restricted to the free basic amount through flow-
restrictors or prepayment water meters.
From a developmental, as well as a legal, perspective,
total water disconnections are wholly unacceptable.
Likewise, the imposition of prepayment water meters,
which disconnect water automatically, and flow-
restrictors, which drastically reduce flow rates, are
not acceptable. Rather, water disconnection to poor
households should be governed by considerations of
equity, to ensure that people who are unable to pay for
water do not have their health and dignity compromised
by a municipality disconnecting their water supply. In
a number of countries, including Spain and Germany,
water disconnection is not permitted unless the water
company can prove that it has no other means to
obtain payment of its bill. In England and Wales,
water disconnection was prohibited by law in 1999
while in France families with children and disabled
persons may not be disconnected and poor people
can make use of temporary moratoriums for payment
and seek financial assistance from local social services.
In many municipalities, French mayors have decided
neither to disconnect poor people, nor to allow water
utilities to do it.
South African municipalities need to develop a
principled approach to water disconnection and
restriction, emphasising equity and human rights
considerations. Within such an approach, poor and
vulnerable people should not be left without water
and credit control enforcement should be focused on
the rich, rather than on the poor. This suggests a role
for DWAF in regulating, monitoring and enforcing
guidelines and safeguards across municipalities. In
addition, ways must be found to prevent water debt
in the first place. This includes subsidising water
services, including operations and maintenance
costs, to poor households and communities, whether
through steeper tariffs for luxury consumption within
a municipality and/or greater transfers from national
government.
Financial and Technical
Assistance
From our research it is apparent that current Municipal
Infrastructure Grant (MIG) and Equitable Share (ES)
funding allocations are insufficient to ensure universal
access to adequate water and sanitation, particularly in
uniformly poor municipalities with limited potential
to secure revenue from internal tariff cross-subsidies.
A frequent casualty of this reality is proper attention
to the maintenance of infrastructure, meaning that
municipalities face chronic problems of faulty piping
etc., which adversely affects their quality of service as
Water Services Fault Lines
6
well as their long-term finances (while savings can be
made in the short-term by neglecting maintenance,
in the medium- and long-term such neglect leads
to higher costs). A further exacerbating factor is
municipalities’ inability to attract the requisite skilled
personnel to carry out key functions. It is clear that if
water services are to be prioritised as they should be,
additional funding from national government must
be made available to ensure the necessary financial,
technical and human resources reach the municipal
level, where water services delivery occurs.
Water Quality
In many countries, water quality is managed by the
health, rather than the water, department. In South
Africa there has been a somewhat unsatisfactory
division of responsibility between health and water
departments but, until recently, DWAF has been
relatively successful at ensuring high water quality
standards across the country. However, there is
evidence that DWAF’s system of water quality
management is under strain and requires urgent
attention to avert further water contamination and
related deaths.
DWAF needs to address the deteriorating water
quality in dams and to ensure uniform compliance
with water quality standards across municipalities.
We fear that the new certification scheme, especially if
focused merely at naming and shaming non-complying
municipalities, will not address the root causes of the
problem, which relate to insufficient financial and
technical assistance, as well as human capacity, at the
local government level.
Water Demand Management
(WDM)
It is clear from our research that water leaks and
inferior water infrastructure need to be addressed
as a matter of priority. Furthermore, water demand
audits that provide an analysis of assets and promote
engagement with communities need to be undertaken
by municipalities in order to understand the complex
relationship between long-term supply and demand.
Such information needs to form the basis of FBS and
tariff structures in a way that satisfies ‘green’ and ‘red’
objectives. DWAF as the national regulator could
intervene to assist under-capacitated municipalities to
develop appropriate WDM strategies, which ensure
that poor households have access to enough water
to sustain a healthy and dignified life, and that large
consumers like industry, agriculture and hedonistic
residential consumers are penalised for their excessive
consumption. Water conservation education should be
undertaken with the ultimate goal to ensure access to
adequate and safe water for all and to curb hedonistic
water consumption.
Public Participation
Public participation is a key tenet of democratic
governance and the legal and policy set up for post-
apartheid water services. Although we did not focus
on public participation from an end-user/community
perspective, it is evident from our research that the
current forums of public participation – ward councils
and Integrated Development Plan (IDP) and Water
Service Development Plan (WSDP) processes –
are failing to adequately incorporate input from
communities, and particularly from marginalised and
poor communities. There is a clear need to rethink
public participation so as to actively incorporate public
input.
More progressive methods to facilitate public
participation are used in eThekwini and City
of Cape Town, where both municipalities have
ostensibly recognised the problems associated with
ward committees and opted for more inclusive and
participative methods such as the Raising the Citizens’
Voice Project. While there are valid criticisms of the
actual inclusive participation aspect of these initiatives,
they are undoubtedly an improvement.
7
7
Recommendations
Based on our findings across the nine fault lines, we
identify the pressing need for:
Greater financial and technical support to 1.
municipalities, including funds and deployment
of personnel. This is especially for poor
municipalities that are under-spending and not
reducing their backlogs quickly enough and those
which have limited potential to raise internal
revenue through cross-subsidisation with rich
water users.
Prioritisation of efforts to eradicate all backlogs 2.
and advance levels of service, including
finalising and implementing an appropriate
Free Basic Sanitation (FBSan) policy, and
implementing an adequate
per person per day
Free Basic Water (FBW) allocation across
all municipalities, starting with a national
minimum amount of 50 litres per person per
day.
Abandonment of using the indigent policy and 3.
register to allocate FBS and, instead, utilisation
of universal allocation of FBS or geographic
targeting. This may require research into ways
to effectively cross-subsidise across bands of
domestic water users, including an investigation
of elasticity of demand at the different levels of
consumption.
National regulation of all water tariffs to ensure4.
equitable reflection of social and
|
environmental justice objectives, and
a price cap for the first tariff block/s following
|
the FBW block across all municipalities
i.e. to ensure uniformly low tariffs for low
consumption and to get away from the
situation in which poor people in the poorest
municipalities often have to pay higher prices
for water than in richer municipalities,
as well as research into consumption, costs
|
and affordability of water services across low-
income households.
National regulation of credit control practices to 5.
ensure
fair enforcement between different classes of
|
water users, including the establishment of
pro-poor policies on disconnections, and
prohibition of prepayment water meters and
|
other pernicious water restriction devices in
poor communities.
More effective national regulation of water quality 6.
control.
Executive Summary
Water Services Fault Lines
South Africa has one of the most progressive legislative
and policy frameworks for water services1 in the world,
which includes a constitutional right to water and a
national Free Basic Water (FBW) policy. Within this
framework, water is conceived of as a social good and
a vital part of the broader developmental project to
“improve the quality of life of all citizens and free the
potential of each person.”2 However, on the ground in
the local government sphere where water services are
located, the reality is quite different. As highlighted in
this report, at the municipal level it is cost-recovery,3
rather than social or developmental benefit, that largely
determines water services delivery. As a consequence,
for many South Africans, access to sufficient water
and sanitation remains a pipedream. Undoubtedly,
many of the impediments to equitable water services
are rooted in the apartheid legacy of unequal service
1 Throughout this report we use the definition of water
services utilised in the Department of Water Affairs
and Forestry’s (DWAF), “Strategic Framework for
Water Services: Water is life, sanitation is dignity”
(September, 2003) (Strategic Framework), p. 2: “The
term water services means water supply services and/or
sanitation services or any part thereof” (this encompasses
all forms of sanitation, whether water-borne or not).
We acknowledge that we have focused more on water
than sanitation provision, which undoubtedly deserves
further research and analysis.
2 Preamble of the Constitution of the Republic of South
Africa Act 108 of 1996.
3 Cost-recovery refers to the recovery of all, or most, of
the cost associated with providing a particular service by
a service provider. For publicly-owned service providers
this may or may not include a surplus over and above the
cost of production, whereas for privately-owned service
providers it necessarily includes a surplus or profit. The
objective in both cases is however, to recoup the full
cost of production. From McDonald, D., “The Theory
and Practice of Cost Recovery in South Africa.” In
McDonald, D. and Pape, J. (eds.), Cost Recovery and
the Crisis of Service Delivery in South Africa (London,
2002), p. 18.
Water Services Fault Lines
One
Introduction
delivery.4 But, as we explore in this report, a range
of factors continue to frustrate the goal of universal
access to water services.
Under apartheid, the central state bore the cost of
providing water services and, in line with apartheid
logic, it heavily subsidised infrastructure and services
to wealthy white communities. In these areas (which
remain predominantly white in profile), water services
infrastructure is usually still of a much higher standard
than in poor black communities and requires less
maintenance, lowering the cost of service provision.5
Whereas in poor and marginalised communities
(located in predominantly black areas), which represent
the majority of South Africa’s population and
geography, neglected and deteriorating infrastructure
requires high maintenance and upgrading costs. Thus,
there is a need to provide new infrastructure to eradicate
backlogs and extend services to disadvantaged areas that
previously had no water services whatsoever. All the
while, municipalities are under considerable pressure,
in terms both of internal accounting mechanisms and
national government oversight, to recover costs from
all areas, including poor communities. This is because,
in an attempt to promote the National Treasury’s
focus on fiscal discipline, as well as to curb corruption
and misspending, municipalities are required to
balance their budgets. There is consequently a
generalised adherence by municipalities to a cost-
recovery dominated approach – tempered to a greater
4 In 1994, according to the African National Congress
(ANC)’s 1994 Reconstruction and Development
Programme (RDP), 12 million South Africans did
not have access to clean drinking water and 21 million
people did not have access to adequate sanitation (para.
2.6.1): http://www.anc.org.za/rdp/rdp2.html#2.6.
Accessed 15 October 2008.
5 McDonald, D., “The Theory and Practice of Cost
Recovery in South Africa”, at note 3, p. 27.
8
8
Introduction
ONE
or lesser extent with equity concerns - in which
water is viewed primarily as a commercial good and
in most instances is actually one of the main sources
a revenue for cash-strapped municipalities.6 Yet, in
the context of historical disadvantage and structural
inequality, attempting to enforce cost-recovery in poor
communities is unfair and contradicts broader national
developmental goals. It has also impacted negatively on
the ability of municipalities to achieve universal access
to water services, resulting in significant segments
of the population suffering without adequate water
supply and sanitation.
There can be no doubt about the importance of
water services to the wellbeing and socio-economic
development of human beings. Yet, to date, the
practicalities of water services delivery at the municipal
level have been under-researched. As the Department
of Water Affairs and Forestry (DWAF) takes on
a new role as the national water sector regulator,
the need to understand the dynamics of local water
and sanitation provision is not only essential, but
opportune. This report aims to contribute to such
an understanding in the hope that existing problems
and inequalities might be tackled so that they do not
eventually culminate in a crisis similar to that currently
experienced in the energy sector.7
6 Makgetla, N., “Local budgets and development.”
Unpublished paper (March 2006).
7 “SA’s straining water supply system is putting the
health of millions of people at risk, and experts warn
that a crisis similar to that in electricity supply will
develop if no immediate steps are taken to preserve
water quality” – “Developing crisis number two.” The
Weekender (17-18 May 2008): http://216.239.59.104/
search?q=cache:MjjO7OWUcjUJ:www.
businessday.co.za/weekender/article.aspx%3FID%
3DBD4A768167+Recent+water+incidents+site:.
Locating our research in fifteen municipalities, we
identified several specific water services-related
fault lines that act as barriers to accessing water and
sanitation at the local level. These fault lines are
explored in this report. They include problems around
eliminating backlogs and improving levels of service;
Free Basic Services (FBS); indigent policy as the FBS
targeting mechanism; tariff structures; credit control
enforcement; financial and technical assistance; water
quality; water demand management (WDM); and
public participation.
za&hl=en&ct=clnk&cd=3. Accessed 15 October
2008.
9
Water Services Fault Lines
From November 2007 to February 2008, Marc
Dettmann and Kate Tissington from the Centre for
Applied Legal Studies (CALS) and Malcolm Langford
and Denile Samuels from the Norwegian Centre
for Human Rights (NCHR), conducted interviews
with local officials from fifteen municipalities on
various aspects of water services delivery, focussing
on the provision of water and sanitation to residential
properties within the municipalities. These
municipalities are located in various provinces and
include:
Western Cape: City of Cape Town Metropolitan
Municipality, Cape Winelands District
Municipality, Stellenbosch Municipality and
Witzenberg Local Municipality
Mpumalanga : Dr J.S. Moroka Municipality and
Albert Luthuli Municipality
Limpopo : Lepelle-Nkumpi Local Municipality and
Blouberg Municipality
North West: Moses Kotane Local Municipality and
Local Municipality of Madibeng
Kwazulu Natal : eThekwini Metropolitan
Municipality and Msunduzi Municipality
Gauteng: Ekurhuleni Metropolitan Municipality
Eastern Cape: Nelson Mandela Metropolitan
Municipality and Amathole District
Municipality.
In addition, a Vhembe District Municipality
official (located in Limpopo) was also interviewed
and although this authority was not formally
included, the interview provides background
information for some of the analysis.
We chose to survey a mix of urban and rural
municipalities, aiming to provide a snapshot of the
different approaches that municipalities take to
water and sanitation provision in South Africa. Four
of the municipalities in our survey can be classed as
urban, two as rural, five as predominantly rural and
four as mixed.8 We acknowledge having focused on
account holders over non-account holders and water
over sanitation. These shortcomings are discussed in
further detail in the fault line on eliminating backlogs
and improving levels of service in part 5.1.
Our interviews examined a wide range of issues,
including budgeting and finance, the relationship of
the municipality with DWAF, water quality, indigent
policy, FBS, tariff structures, disconnections, public
participation and institutional capacity. We spoke to
people in various positions within the municipalities,
including directors, deputy directors and heads of water
and sanitation; planning technicians; Department of
Finance, treasury and budget personnel; an Integrated
Development Plan (IDP) director, a director of
infrastructure development; a manager of technical
services; chief water engineers, heads of Water Services
Development Plans (WSDPs), a deputy director of
engineering services, planning and construction; and
a chief accountant for water and sanitation, amongst
others.9 Because we wanted to identify cross-cutting,
systemic, issues, this report does not delve deeply into
the specifics of the institutional and administrative
setups for water services across municipalities –
however, this is a topic that requires further research,
as it would appear that institutional form might affect
8 While we acknowledge that there are differing
definitions of rural and urban, we have gathered our
demographic information from Statistics South Africa
and have used their definitions.
9 We have not included a list of the officials we spoke to
– personal anonymity was a condition of the interviews
(we did make it clear that we would publish the names of
the municipalities, as well as the information pertaining
to each municipality). Our aim was neither to shame
individual municipalities nor to attribute blame, but
rather to highlight systemic, structural, problems with
water services provision in South Africa.
Two
Methodology
10
service delivery, accountability, public participation
etc.
The objective of the in-depth interviews with municipal
officials (often running to several hours each) was
to gauge the attitudes of municipalities and officials,
and to elicit factual information about waters services
provision within their jurisdiction. After the interview
process, this input was cross-checked against and
supplemented with additional information (gleaned
from IDPs, WSDPs, publicised indigent, tariff and
credit control policies) to maximise accuracy. We then
tabled the information into a matrix, which plotted
information about water services in each municipality
across our survey questions.
Once we had verified as many of the data as we could,
we used the matrix to identify cross-cutting ‘fault
lines’, which formed the basis of this report. The fault
lines highlighted in this report do not represent all the
apparent problems at municipal level –rather, they
reflect what we perceived to be systemic obstacles to
the provision of universal access to water services.
On 20 May 2008, a national workshop was held at
CALS which was attended by interested civil society
organisations, academics and activists from around
South Africa. The debates and ideas that emerged
from lively discussions held in response to the draft
of this report were then incorporated into the final
report. The report was written and edited by Kate
Tissington (CALS), Marc Dettmann (CALS),
Malcolm Langford (NCHR), Jackie Dugard (CALS)
and Sonkita Conteh (COHRE), between June and
October 2008. Anokhi Parikh, a researcher at CALS,
kindly did the final proof-reading and assisted with the
tariff graphs. Where relevant, we have supplemented
information with recent reports and newspaper
articles.
While we have attempted, through the processes
outlined, to ensure accurate data, it should be noted
that it is not possible to access 100 percent accurate
information from municipalities. Indeed, in many
municipalities, officials were unable to answer our
questions or provide relevant statistics. Because
most of DWAF’s information comes directly from
municipalities, this means that DWAF’s data, too, are
not necessarily reliable, reflective or up-to-date.
Finally, the contributors would like to thank all the
officials from municipalities and DWAF that we
interviewed, as well as all the academics and NGO,
community-based organisation (CBO) and social
movement representatives and community members
who contributed to this research. We are indebted
to Marc Dettmann, who volunteered at CALS for a
year and championed this project so generously and
wholeheartedly for the duration of his stay. This
research and the report were made possible through
funding from COHRE and NCHR, which we
gratefully acknowledge.
Methodology
TWO
11
Water Services Fault Lines
Local government operates in terms of a specific
legislative/policy framework, which governs, to an
extent, its functioning in regard to water services
provision. Notwithstanding our research finding that
municipalities function very differently from each
other in the way they provide water and sanitation to
their constituencies (we detail the various responses
across the identified fault lines in part 5 of the report),
it is important to outline the frameworks within which
water services are located, before turning to the reality
on the ground. Part 3 provides an overview of the
relevant legislation and policy documents that govern
water services provision in South Africa.
Section 27(1)(b) of the Constitution of the Republic
of South Africa Act 108 of 1996 (Constitution)
provides everyone with the right of access to “sufficient
water”, and section 27(2) obliges the state to “take
reasonable legislative and other measures, within
its available resources, to achieve the progressive
realisation” of everyone’s right of access to sufficient
water. It is schedule 4(b) of the Constitution, which
determines that water and sanitation services are local
government matters.
The Constitution also highlights the importance of
human dignity, providing in section 10 that “everyone
has inherent dignity and the right to have their dignity
respected and protected”. It further emphasises the
need to promote equality. The equality clauses in
section 9 prohibit the state from unfairly discriminating
“directly or indirectly against anyone on one or more
grounds, including race, gender, sex, pregnancy,
marital status, ethnic or social origin, colour, sexual
orientation, age, disability, religion, conscience, belief,
culture, language and birth.”10 Moreover, section 9(2)
explicitly sanctions affirmative action by stating:
10 Section 9(3) of the Constitution of the Republic of
South Africa.
Equality includes the full and equal enjoyment of all
rights and freedoms. To promote the achievement of
equality, legislative and other measures designed to
protect or advance persons or categories of persons
disadvantaged by unfair discrimination may be
taken.
In the context of water services, this means not only
that no water-related programme or policy may
unfairly discriminate against any group of historically
disadvantaged people (for example, any water credit
control measure must not be imposed only on poor
communities), but also that any bias in favour of
historically disadvantaged people will not amount
to unfair discrimination and is acceptable (meaning,
for example, that water tariffs for the same levels of
consumption can be lower in poor communities than
in richer communities).
Protection of the right of access to water is considerably
bolstered by section 33(1) of the Constitution, which
provides for just administrative action and states that
“everyone has the right to just administrative action
that is lawful, reasonable and procedurally fair”,
and section 33(3) provides that “national legislation
must be enacted to give effect to these rights.” The
Promotion of Administrative Justice Act 3 of 2000
(PAJA) was enacted to give effect to these rights,
which are particularly important in the context of
disconnection of water services.
In terms of water services, specifically, while the
National Water Act 36 of 1998 (National Water
Act) creates a comprehensive legal framework for the
management of water resources in South Africa, which
remains the responsibility of national government, the
Water Services Act 108 of 1997 (Water Services
Act) is the primary legal instrument relating to the
accessibility and provision of water services (which
Three
Legal and Policy Framework for Water
Services in South Africa
12
includes drinking water and sanitation services) to
households and other municipal water users by local
government.
The Water Services Act acknowledges that, although
municipalities have the authority to administer water
and sanitation services, all spheres of government have
a duty within their physical and financial capabilities,
to work towards this goal. The Act defines ‘basic water
supply’ as “the prescribed minimum standard of water
supply services necessary for the reliable supply of a
sufficient quantity and quality of water to households,
including informal households, to support life and
personal hygiene.”11 ‘Basic sanitation’ is described as the
“prescribed minimum standard of services necessary
for the safe, hygienic and adequate collection, removal,
disposal or purification of human excreta, domestic
waste water and sewage from households, including
informal households.”12 Importantly, section 5 of
the Water Services Act states that, if water services
provided by water services institutions fail to meet the
needs of all their customers, they must give preference
to the provision of basic water supply and basic
sanitation. In cases of emergency, basic water supply
and sanitation services must be provided, even at the
cost of the water services authority.13 Section 4(3) of
the Water Services Act states that procedures for the
limitation or discontinuation of water must “be fair
and equitable” and “provide for reasonable notice of
intention to limit or discontinue water services and
for an opportunity to make representations.” This
procedural protection against unfair limitation or
11 Section 1(iii) of the Water Services Act. “Water
Services Act, 1997 (Act 108 of 1997)” (19 December
1997): http://www.wrc.org.za/downloads/legislature/
WSA108-97.pdf.
12 Section 1(ii) of the Water Services Act.
13 Section 5 of the Water Services Act.
disconnection of water supply echoes the procedural
protections found in section 3(2)(b) of PAJA.
The Local Government: Municipal Structures Act
117 of 1998 (Municipal Structures Act) governs
the institutional arrangements of local government,
including water services provision. The Local
Government Municipal Systems Act 32 of 2000
(Municipal Systems Act) provides the machinery
and procedures to enable municipalities to uplift their
communities socially and economically, and guarantee
affordable universal access to basic services. It seeks
to empower the poor and ensure that municipalities
establish service tariffs and credit control policies that
take their needs into account.
Other legal and statutory requirements relating to
municipal revenue and credit control, which affect
water services are found in the following legislation:
Division of Revenue Act (promulgated annually)
(DORA)
Local Government: Municipal Finance
Management Act 56 of 2003
Local Government: Municipal Property Rates
Act 6 of 2004
Complementing the legislation are several official
documents on water and sanitation. There have
been three White Papers on water supply (the 1994
“Water Supply and Sanitation Policy White Paper”,
the 1997 “White Paper on a National Water Policy
for South Africa”, and the 2002 “Draft White Paper
on Water Services”). In 2001, the “White Paper on
Basic Household Sanitation” was published, which
specifically focused on the provision of a level of basic
household sanitation to mainly rural communities and
informal settlements, which it identified as the areas
with the greatest need.
Legal and Policy Framework for Water Services in South Africa
THREE
13
Water Services Fault Lines
14
In 2002 the DWAF “Free Basic Water
Implementation Strategy” (FBW Implementation
Strategy) was launched,14 which ostensibly targets the
water needs of the poorest citizens by guaranteeing
each household a free minimum quantity of potable
water, benchmarked at 6 kilolitres (‘6kl’, which is
6 000 litres) per household per month.15 DWAF’s
“Strategic Framework for Water Services” (2003)
(Strategic Framework), with its slogan “Water is life,
sanitation is dignity,” is a national umbrella framework
for the water services sector, that seeks to align
policies, legislation and strategies with respect to the
provision of water services in South Africa, outlining
the changes in approach needed to achieve policy
goals.16 The Strategic Framework sets out the future
role of DWAF as the national sector regulator and
provides background for many of the issues discussed
below. Most recently, the DWAF, “National Water
Services Regulation Strategy,”17 which is still in draft
form, provides the basis for the genesis of DWAF as a
national regulator of water services.
Together, these legislative and policy imperatives
suggest a dignified, equitable and administratively
just approach to water services in which everyone
has access to adequate, safe and affordable water and
sanitation. However, as explored below, the reality on
the ground is far more complex and, to varying degrees,
problematic. It is evident that water services provision,
levels of service and administrative processes vary
considerably across and within municipalities. Given
the critical nature of water services, as well as the legal
imperatives mentioned above, it is clear that some form
of uniform regulation and enforcement is required in
14 DWAF, “Free Basic Water Implementation Strategy.”
(August 2002) (FBW Implementation Strategy):
http://www.dwaf.gov.za/Documents/FBW/
FBWImplementStrategyAug2002.pdf.
15 The national benchmark of 6 kilolitres (kl) or 6000
litres (l) per household per month is equivalent to 25
litres per capita (person) per day (lcd) working on an
average of eight persons per household.
16 DWAF, Strategic Framework, p. ii.
17 DWAF, “National Water Services Regulation
Strategy: Penultimate Draft” (April 2008): Not yet
available electronically.
the water services sector to ensure equitable access,
particularly regarding the extension of free basic water
and sanitation.
This part provides descriptions of some key
institutions, funding mechanisms, and processes that
are important in the context of water services provision
in South Africa.
4.1. Water Services Authorities
(WSAs) and Water Services
Providers (WSPs)
A Water Services Authority (WSA) is responsible
for ensuring access to water services within its area of
jurisdiction. Whether a metropolitan, district or local
municipality, or a rural council, a WSA has executive
authority to provide water services within its area of
jurisdiction. This power is derived from the Municipal
Structures Act or the ministerial authorisations made
in terms of this Act. According to the Water Services
Act, every WSA must draft a WSDP for its area of
jurisdiction.
A Water Services Provider (WSP) is any entity that
has a contract with a WSA to assume operational
responsibility for providing water services to one
or more consumers (end users) within a specific
geographic area. A WSA may perform the functions
of a WSP itself, enter into a written contract with
a WSP, or form a joint venture with another water
services institution to provide water services to end
users. However, a WSA may only enter into a contract
with a private sector WSP after it has considered all
known public sector WSPs which are willing and able
to perform the relevant functions. A WSP, if not the
same as the WSA, must be approved by the relevant
WSA in order to provide water services and may be
local or regional, depending on whether it provides
water services to more than one WSA. A WSA may act
as a WSP outside its area of jurisdiction if contracted
to do so by the WSA for the area in question.
Seven municipalities (Moses Kotane, Madibeng,
Dr J.S. Moroka, Nelson Mandela Metro, City
of Cape Town, Stellenbosch and Witzenberg)
are both the WSA and WSP within their
jurisdiction;
Albert Luthuli is the WSA and the WSP for two
water schemes while DWAF is the WSP for the
other six schemes;
In Lepelle-Nkumpi and Blouberg, Capricorn
District Municipality is both the WSA and
WSP;
Ekurhuleni is the WSA while Rand Water is the
WSP;
eThekwini is the WSA while Umgeni Water is
the bulk WSP;
Amathole District Municipality is the WSA for
the district while the WSPs include itself, local
municipalities and Amatola Water;
Msunduzi is the WSA and Amatola Water is
the WSP; and
Cape Winelands District Municipality is
the WSA but is principally concerned with
ensuring farm dwellers access water while local
municipalities i.e. Witzenberg, are responsible for
piped water.
4.2. DWAF as the Water Services
National Regulator
Section 155(7) of the Constitution, as well as section
62(1) of the Water Services Act, mandate national
government to monitor the performance of the water
sector, and specifically grant DWAF the mandate
to monitor the performance of all water services
institutions. However, until recently, this DWAF
mandate did not encompass a role as national water
services regulator. The recently published draft
Four
Key Concepts in Water Services Provision
FOUR Key Concepts in Water Services Provision
15
Water Services Fault Lines
16
National Water Services Regulation Strategy (April
2008) hopes to fill this critical regulatory gap, by
establishing DWAF as the national regulator of the
water services sector, and it shifts DWAF’s role from
water services provider and player to that of regulator
or “referee.”18
The National Water Services Regulation Strategy
process is a relatively recent endeavour, having started
in 2006. The Strategy is still in draft form, and the
structures, policies and functions are still under
construction. It is not known when the Strategy will
be finalised and there are signals that deadlines are
being shifted to incorporate a much broader regulatory
vision, including Water Demand Management, which
will inevitably delay the process. In the meantime,
there is still very little national regulation of local water
services provision, except for the monitoring of water
quality, and the new national regulatory policy and
designated unit have only recently been established.
This has meant that, until now, water regulation has
largely been left to individual municipalities.19 Our
research suggests that municipalities have often not
regulated in the public interest. In general terms, the
absence of national regulation has resulted in vastly
differing tariffs, standards and restrictions etc., which
have, in many cases, compromised access to water for
poor and marginalised communities.
According to the draft National Water Services
Regulation Strategy, WSAs will have to report across
18 Ibid.
19 In the absence of a national water regulator (such as
exists for energy), to the extent that it has occurred at
all, regulation has been undertaken by WSAs. This
study did not evaluate the extent to which WSA
regulation, has been functional/effective. This is
because, ascertaining whether WSAs are regulating in
the interest of poor communities would have entailed
in-depth research in communities, which was not
possible in this project. However, a key finding of our
research is that much greater national regulation in the
public interest is necessary. This conclusion is drawn
from the persistence at local government level of the
kinds of fault lines that we explore in the report, many
of which could be addressed or ameliorated through
effective national regulation.
a number of Key Performance Indicators, which will
assist DWAF to make performance assessments. The
plan is to introduce incentives to encourage WSAs to
report and perform effectively. DWAF will have legal
recourse against non-compliance by WSAs, as well
as the ability to hand over water services functions
to different departments or spheres of government if
there is a major problem. DWAF will also be able to
intervene in service delivery if there is a gross failure
on the part of a WSA and where lives and/or the
environment are at risk.
According to the new national strategy, “DWAF as
the national regulator will be concerned only with
high-level performance and with outcomes, not the
detailed processes.”20 The key regulatory areas laid
out in DWAF’s National Water Services Regulation
Strategy and the responsible government agencies
are:
Social regulation: 1. access to services, affordability of
services and pro-poor tariffs (Department of
Provincial and Local Government (DPLG) is the
lead agency, assisted by DWAF, the National
Treasury and the Department of Housing);
Drinking water quality: 2. DWAF is the lead agency
assisted by the Department of Health (DoH);
Environmental health regulation:3. public health and
environmental health (DoH is the lead agency,
assisted by DWAF);
Water resources regulation: 4. DWAF is the lead agency;
Economic regulation:5. price, performance, value for
money and efficiency (National Treasury is the
lead agency, assisted by DWAF).
Within this regulatory framework it is noticeable
that, for many of the key fault lines analysed in this
report, the DPLG, DoH and National Treasury are
listed as the lead regulators, assisted by DWAF. This
is interesting because, currently, in the absence of
such a framework, which acknowledges the inherent
20 DWAF, National Water Services Regulation Strategy,
p. 55.
17
connectivity of water with other critical services,
water services are fundamentally de-linked from the
other services. For example, at the local level, water
is not viewed through the lens of its health-related
component. Similarly, water services are currently
not adequately coordinated with housing services.
Such de-linking of functions might be related to the
constitutional setup in terms of which healthcare and
housing services are functional areas of provincial
and national legislative competence, while water
supply and sanitation are local government matters.
It appears that this constitutional arrangement has
unnecessarily fragmented functions and services
that should be integrated, adversely affecting
municipalities’ extension of (all) services to the poor.
In this respect, it is hoped that DWAF’s regulatory
function appropriately addresses these issues through
effective inter-departmental and inter-governmental
coordination.
Part 5 details some of the specific linkage/inter-
departmental related issues, as follows:
Part 5.3 deals with inter-departmental issues
relating to the DPLG-administered indigent
policy framework, which is adapted at the local
level and in many municipalities is the main form
of FBW allocation (see part 4.8 for background
on the indigent policy);
Part 5.1.2 highlights the important link between
DWAF and the National Department of
Housing, as well as with the provincial housing
departments and local authorities which are
tasked with housing delivery, in issues relating to
housing and water services provision;
Part 5.6.1 covers problems around the multi-
departmental facilitation of the Municipal
Infrastructure Grant (MIG), which is primarily
administered by the DPLG, and which is vitally
important for water services provision (see part
4.4 for background on the MIG);
Part 5.7.2 deals with drinking water quality
and the relationship between DWAF, local
authorities and the DoH in regulating and
enforcing water quality standards.
4.3. The Section 78 Assessment
Process
The process of deciding what institutional arrangement
will be responsible for water and sanitation service
provision within a municipality is known as the
section 78 assessment process (it is governed by
section 78 of the Municipal Systems Act) – it describes
the process of formally delineating/appointing a
WSP. Historically DWAF was, and in some areas
remains, the WSP. There is a push, however, for
municipalities to complete the section 78 process in
order to institutionalise the entity (itself, a ring-fenced
public company or a private concession) that is to
execute water services delivery in each municipal area
of jurisdiction. The move from DWAF as WSP to
local municipality as WSP has shifted the financial
and technical burden of water and sanitation service
delivery to local municipalities. Those services that
had previously been fully subsidised for operating costs
under DWAF must utilise cost-recovery mechanisms
while drawing as many funds as they still can from
national government.
The section 78 assessment process is designed to take
the local context into consideration when deciding
which type of service delivery mechanism (either
internal or external) will be most appropriate and
effective. The preliminary step in the process is an
analysis of current infrastructure, water resources,
financial resources and institutional capacity of the
municipality. A report on the status quo is then given
and the section 78 process begins with an internal
assessment, after which a decision is made whether or
not to implement appropriate internal service delivery
mechanisms or to explore external mechanisms. If the
latter is decided, then external assessment is undertaken
taking into consideration direct and indirect costs and
benefits; effect on the environment, human health,
well-being and safety; the capacity and potential
FOUR Key Concepts in Water Services Provision
Water Services Fault Lines
18
future capacity of prospective service providers to
furnish the skills, expertise and resources; views of the
local community; the likely impact on development
and employment patterns in the municipality; and the
views of organised labour. Finally a decision is made
whether to implement internal or external mechanisms
of service delivery within the municipality.
Despite the push from national government for
municipalities to complete section 78 assessment
processes, many municipalities have not yet done so,
often due to incapacity. In our study, Lepelle-Nkumpi,
Blouberg, Albert Luthuli, Amathole and Msunduzi
are yet to complete this process.21
4.4. Municipal Infrastructure
Grant (MIG)
The Municipal Infrastructure Grant (MIG) is a
consolidated conditional grant to municipalities
designed to facilitate the eradication of basic services
backlogs and cover the capital costs of infrastructure
rollout to poor households predominantly, although
beneficiaries of the grant may also be municipal
services or institutions used extensively by the poor
or businesses which are run by the poor.22 The MIG
is a temporary measure, officially in place until 2013
or until municipalities are able to adequately raise
internal revenue to cover all costs themselves.
The calculation of the MIG uses a formula which
takes into account the number of water and sanitation
backlogs in the municipality, the water and sanitation
allocation amount and the total number of backlogs in
21 No municipality mentioned its awareness of the
National Joint Response Team (NJRT), a team
comprising people from DWAF, DPLG, National
Treasury and SALGA, designed to assist municipalities
with building capacity and providing legal, technical
and financial assistance in the section 78 assessment
processes.
22 DPLG, “Policy Framework for the Implementation
of the Municipal Infrastructure Grant (MIG)” (5
February 2004) (Policy Framework), p. 3: http://www.
DPLG.gov.za/subwebsites/mig/docs/2.pdf. Accessed
15 October 2008.
South Africa.23 There is a horizontal split of the MIG
allocation to metropolitan and local municipalities
based on poverty, backlogs and identification as a node.
Because of the two tier system of local government,
the amount allocated to each local municipality is
shared in a vertical split between the district and local
municipality. The methodology for doing this is based
primarily on an assessment of where the function
for each municipal service lies.24 No MIG funding
can be spent apart from that within the pre-existing
IDP and approved budget spending. The largest
proportion of the MIG fund goes towards funding
municipalities, the allocation of which is based on a
formula. Another portion of the MIG fund is used for
the Special Municipal Infrastructure Fund (SMIF)
which is provided to specific municipalities based on
an application process. Two types of projects receive
this investment; those assisting innovation and those
that require regional investment. Some infrastructure
projects are more cost effective when they cover
adjoining municipalities and the SMIF assists with
the capital investment in such projects. There is
multi-departmental responsibility for monitoring of
the MIG, with the DPLG, DWAF, the Department
of Public Works (DPW) and National Treasury
each responsible for different aspects.25 Problems with
MIG allocation are discussed in part 5.6.1.
4.5. Local Government Equitable
Share (ES)
The Local Government Equitable Share (ES) is an
unconditional grant from national government to local
government (meaning that municipalities do not have
to report on how they allocate or spend the ES), which
serves as the main subsidy for O/M costs. The ES is
meant to complement the MIG. The amount allocated
to each municipality is determined by assessing
fiscal capacity, fiscal efficiency, developmental needs,
23 Ibid., Appendix A, p.2.
24 Ibid., pp. 8-9.
25 Ibid., pp. 11-18. See this for information on the
institutional arrangements for the MIG allocation.
19
poverty and backlogs. The ES grant is determined by
the formula:
ES Grant = B + D + I – R ± C where
B = Basic Service Component which supports
poor households earning less than R800/month;
D = Developmental Component;
I = Institutional Support Component which
determines the basic cost of administration
(determined I = base allocation + [Admin
support × Population] + [Council support × No
seats]);
R = Revenue Raising Capacity Correction (a
proxy figure derived from reported revenue
raising capacity information reported to Statistics
South Africa (Stats SA) and objective municipal
information from Stats SA);
C = stabilizing factors (used to ensure that
allocations are not negative due to the revenue
raising component.
Municipalities are not required to report on how they
allocate their ES. There are a number of problems
with the ES allocation which are dealt with in part
5.6.2.
4.6. Free Basic Water (FBW) and
Free Basic Sanitation (FBSan)
Free Basic Water (FBW) and Free Basic Sanitation
(FBSan) form part of a government Free Basic Services
(FBS) package, which is supposed to be made available
to poor households who cannot afford to pay for basic
services. The FBS package typically includes: rebates
on water, sanitation, electricity and refuse removal
to qualifying ‘indigent’ households, and it is the
responsibility of the DPLG to introduce the legislation
and standards applicable to the implementation of
FBS. The DPLG is meant to guide, coordinate and
monitor national programmes, and regulate service
provision, as well as intervene where necessary,
particularly where capacity is required. The DPLG
also provides the required grants to municipalities to
enable the delivery of FBS.26
As the sector leader, it is the responsibility of DWAF
to define the policy and regulation relevant to support
the implementation of FBW and FBSan. DWAF
is responsible for assisting WSAs to implement
FBS, for monitoring the state of implementation of
WSAs, and for determining where interventions
and support are required.27 In 2001, a Cabinet-
approved Free Basic Water and Sanitation Task
Team (FBWSTT) was established, aimed at
strengthening cooperative government approaches
to the implementation of FBW through “hands on
support to targeted municipalities.” The FBWSTT
comprises representatives from the DPLG, the South
African Local Government Association (SALGA),
DWAF and National Treasury.28
Free Basic Water (FBW) policy is not legislated per
se; however, policy outlining free basic water provision
is based on sections of the Water Services Act
(specifically sections 3 and 9), as well as the Compulsory
National Standards (specifically regulation 3(b)),
and provides meaning to the constitutional right to
water. Moreover, it is clear from Constitutional Court
adjudication that government policies pursued to
give meaning to constitutional rights incur the same
kinds of obligations as rights and, consequently,
may be challenged. In the landmark socio-economic
26 DPLG, “Guidelines for the Implementation of the
National Indigent Policy by Municipalities.” Draft
Document 1 (November 2005) (Guidelines), p. 21:
http://fbs.dplg.gov.za/fbs/site/docs/Document
Library/IP/Guidelines.pdf?PHPSESSID=dd245e1e
43caadb037d2946bfb74cd74.
27 Ibid.
28 The FBWSTT has recently initiated the Special
Intervention Programme (SIP), the objective of which
is to accelerate the implementation of FBW in 36
targeted municipalities and to share the benefits, good
practice and lessons learnt from the programme with all
municipalities. See: http://www.fbwsip.gov.za/.
FOUR Key Concepts in Water Services Provision
Water Services Fault Lines
20
rights case, Government of the Republic of South Africa
v Grootboom (‘Grootboom’), the Constitutional Court
established at paragraph 42 that, in terms of the state’s
obligations regarding socio-economic rights:
The state is required to take reasonable legislative
and other measures. Legislative measures by
themselves are not likely to constitute constitutional
compliance. Mere legislation is not enough. The state
is obliged to act to achieve the intended result, and
the legislative measures will invariably have to be
supported by appropriate, well-directed policies and
programmes implemented by the executive.
29
According to FBW policy, set out in the FBW
Implementation Strategy, the volume of 6 000 litres
or 6 kilolitres (6kl) per household per month is set as
the target FBW amount.30 The policy is flexible and it
allows WSAs to decide how they will apply the policy
specifically and practically, as well as encouraging better
resourced WSAs to increase their FBW amount.
According to the FBW Implementation Strategy,
municipalities were meant to implement the policy
with immediate effect, and those municipalities which
could not implement by July 2003 were to be identified
and treated as ‘special cases,’ given the highest level of
support by DWAF.31
FBW is financed through ES and local tariff structures
and can be implemented in three ways:
rising block tariffs, which provide the first block 1.
free and use higher end tariffs to cross-subsidise;
service level targeting whereby water is free 2.
for those accessing water via a standpipe or a
restricted flow mechanism; or
targeted credits and subsidies whereby qualified 3.
or targeted users receive a free allocation of water.
In most municipalities the amount of FBW is generally
6 kilolitres per household per month, which translates
to an amount of approximately 25 litres per person per
29 Government of the Republic of South Africa v
Grootboom 2001 (1) SA 46 (CC), para. 42.
30 DWAF, FBW Implementation Strategy.
31 Ibid., p. 10.
day for a household of eight people. According to the
Strategic Framework, this amount should eventually
be increased to 50 litres per person per day, which
would mean approximately 12 kilolitres per household
per month for an average household of 8 people.32 The
50 litres per person per day allocation is the amount
stipulated by international experts as the adequate
amount of water per day required to lead a healthy and
dignified life.33 It is also the amount that the ANC’s
1994 Reconstruction and Development Programme
(RDP) stipulated as a medium term goal:
In the medium term, the RDP aims to provide
an on-site supply of 50 - 60 lcd [litres per capita
(person) per day] of clean water, improved on-site
sanitation, and an appropriate household refuse
collection system. Water supply to nearly 100 per
cent of rural households should be achieved over the
medium term, and adequate sanitation facilities
should be provided to at least 75 per cent of rural
households. Community/household preferences
and environmental sustainability will be taken into
account.
34
It is notable that the City of Johannesburg’s FBW
policy has recently been successfully challenged as
insufficient to meet the basic needs of large, poor,
urban households in the Johannesburg High Court
case, Mazibuko & Others v City of Johannesburg &
Others (Mazibuko). In his judgment, Johannesburg
32 DWAF, Strategic Framework, p. 29.
33 Dr Peter Gleick, President of Pacific Institute for
Studies in Development, Environment, and Security,
has stated that a basic requirement for water per
person is 50 litres per day, which translates to about
12kl/month for a household of eight people. See
Mazibuko & Others v City of Johannesburg & Others
(Mazibuko) (case no 06/13865), judgment of 30 April
2008, para. 170: http://web.wits.ac.za/Academic/
Centres/CALS/BasicServices/Litigation.htm.
34 See ANC, RDP, at note 4, para. 2.6.7.
21
High Court Judge Moroa Tsoka ordered the City
of Johannesburg to provide 50 litres of FBW to each
person in a poor community of Soweto (roughly
double the existing allocation for a household of eight
but substantially more for the average household size
of sixteen people).35
At present a Free Basic Sanitation (FBSan) policy
has been developed but has not yet been approved or
implemented, and DWAF is meant to be developing
a FBSan strategy together with a set of guidelines
to assist WSAs to implement the FBSan policy.36
DWAF has acknowledged that the provision of
basic sanitation has been slow and neglected in
comparison to water provision in South Africa, and
that not enough has been done or attention given to
sanitation.37 In the meantime, at local government
level, basic sanitation provision is generally provided
on an ad hoc basis and it is subject to the municipality
to decide what technology is used, taking into account
settlement conditions and operating costs. The
regulation of sanitation is a special case in the sense
that on-site sanitation infrastructure typically belongs
to and is situated on private property, and sanitation
is also often neglected in favour of the regulation of
water supply.38
4.7. Tariff Policy
Local WSAs have the constitutional mandate to set
water services tariffs in their jurisdictions, and national
government is able only to determine principles and
minimum national norms and standards for the
setting of tariffs. National Treasury sets guidelines for
35 Mazibuko judgment, at note 33, para. 168.
36 DWAF, Strategic Framework, p. 31.
37 Speech by Minister of Water Affairs and Forestry
Lindiwe Hendricks at the Launch of National
Sanitation Week, (Johannesburg, 26 May 2008):
http://www.polity.org.za/article.php?a_id=134226.
Accessed 15 October 2008.
38 DWAF, National Water Services Regulation Strategy,
p. 89.
FOUR Key Concepts in Water Services Provision
increases in revenue and expenditure for municipalities,
which must usually be below the rate of inflation,
however this can be negotiated. DWAF has the
power to impose price-caps on water tariffs. While
the implementation of pro-poor tariffs is prescribed
in section 10 of the Water Services Act, and DWAF
can require WSAs to implement pro-poor tariffs, it
cannot prescribe the precise levels or prices of tariffs.
In the future, it is envisaged that DWAF will exercise
a regulatory oversight role over WSAs with respect to
the setting of tariff levels for water services.39
The Strategic Framework states that:
charging for water services is essential in order
to generate funds for operating, maintaining and
investing in water systems. However, tariffs must
take into account the affordability of water services
for the poor. User charges will be based on the volume
of water used and wastewater generated wherever
practical and will reflect full financial and economic
costs, taking into account the subsidies necessary
to ensure the affordability of water services to poor
households.
40
The amount that individual users pay for services
generally should be in proportion to their use of
that service.41 Finally, all connections providing an
uncontrolled volume must be metered and tariffs shall
be applied in proportion to water use.42 A number
of requirements must be followed when developing
water and sanitation tariff policies and some key issues
relating to tariff structures include:
Revenue requirements:
water service institutions
must take into account realistic operations
and maintenance (O/M) costs, interest costs,
depreciation charges, provisions for bad debt and
39 DWAF, Strategic Framework, p. 33.
40 Ibid., p. 26.
41 Ibid., p. 33.
42 Ibid., p. 34.
Water Services Fault Lines
22
future costs of infrastructure and determine the
overall cash needs to secure a financially viable
and sustainable operation.
Costs:
all WSAs must aim to provide households
with a basic level of water supply and sanitation.
The costs associated with the provision of this
basic level of service should in the first instance
be met through the MIG and ES. Any additional
costs to provide or maintain water services
infrastructure must be met through internal
revenue collection.
Contributions:
the contribution from tariffs to the
general fund should be less than 10 percent of
income for the sale of water and no income from
sanitation charges should subsidise other services.
Consumer categories:
retail water and wastewater
tariffs shall distinguish between domestic,
industrial, and other consumers.
Levels of service:
retail water and wastewater
tariffs shall distinguish between different levels
and standards of service and between at least
the following: a communal water service; where
a controlled (limited or restricted) volume of
water is supplied; and where an uncontrolled
volume of water is supplied; where a household
is connected to a sewer; and where a household is
not connected to a sewer.
Cross-subsidies:
tariffs shall support the viability
and sustainability of water services provision
through cross-subsidisation and discourage
wasteful or inefficient use.
Marginal domestic tariff above the basic amount:
where domestic consumers use more than the
defined basic amount, WSAs shall not be entitled
to recoup the full financial cost of providing the
basic amount in the marginal tariff for the next
small increment consumed i.e. the free basic
amount (normally 6kl/month) shall not fall away
if the consumer uses more than this.
Tariff increases:
WSAs must strive to keep tariff
increases below the rate of inflation. Tariff
increases must be based on the efficient use of
resources and the actual cost increases incurred.
Subsidies:
when subsidies for water services
are applied, they should be prioritised for the
provision of basic water supply and sanitation
services in terms of free basic water and free basic
sanitation.
Special tariffs:
may be implemented by WSAs
during periods of water restrictions to reduce
water use to within sustainable levels.
Regulations and guidelines:
DWAF will exercise a
regulatory oversight role over WSAs with respect
to the setting of tariff levels for water services.
The national regulations setting out norms and
standards for tariffs will be revised and updated
to be consistent with the policies in the Strategic
Framework. DWAF will develop guidelines on
the development of water and sanitation tariff
policies and on setting tariffs. These will include
guidelines for determining a reasonable rate of
return on assets. DWAF will also develop a set
of sample water and sanitation tariff policies
reflecting best practice for use by water services
authorities.43
Retail water tariff and sanitation charges (including
bulk water and wastewater tariffs set to recover retail
costs) are set by the WSA in terms of the Water
Services Act and the Municipal Systems Act. Section
56(6)(c) of the National Water Act states that in
setting a pricing strategy for water use charges, the
Minister must consider measures necessary to support
the establishment of tariffs by WSAs in terms of
section 10 of the Water Services Act, and the use of
lifeline tariffs and progressive block tariffs. According
to section 10(1) of the Water Services Act, the Minister
may, with the concurrence of the Minister of Finance,
from time to time prescribe norms and standards
in respect of tariffs for water services. Section 10(2)
states that these norms and standards may –
(a) differentiate on an equitable basis between –
(i) different users of water services;
(ii) different types of water services; and
43 Ibid., pp. 34-35.
23
(iii) different geographic areas, taking into account,
among other factors, the socio-economic and
physical attributes of each area;
(b) place limitations on surplus or profit;
(c) place limitations on the use of income generated by
the recovery of charges;
(d) provide for tariffs to be used to promote or achieve water
conservation.44
According to section 10(4) of the Water Services Act,
no water services institution may use a tariff which
is substantially different from any prescribed norms
and standards. The prescribed national norms and
standards for water services tariffs are set out in the
Norms and Standards in Respect of Tariffs for Water
Services (20 July 2001) (Norms and Standards), which
state in section 6(1) that tariffs for an uncontrolled
supply of water must include a volume based charge
that (a) supports the viability and sustainability of
water supply services to the poor, and (b) discourages
wasteful or inefficient water use. The Norms and
Standard also stipulate that these requirements are
deemed to have been met where the tariff is set as a
volume based charge that provides for a rising block
tariff structure that includes –
(a) three or more tariff blocks with the tariff increasing for
higher consumption blocks;
(b) a consumption level for each block defined as a volume
consumed by a household during any 30 day period;
(c) a first tariff block or lowest tariff block with a maximum
consumption volume of six kilolitres and which is set at
the lowest amount, including a zero amount, required
to ensure the viability and sustainability of water supply
services; and
(d) a tariff for the last block or highest consumption block set
at an amount that would discourage high water use and
that reflects the incremental cost that would be incurred
44 Section 10 of the Water Services Act.
to increase the capacity of the water supply infrastructure
to meet an incremental growth in demand.45
According to regulation 10(2) of the Regulations
relating to Compulsory National Standards and
Measures to Conserve Water (Compulsory National
Standards), in order to manage water services
efficiently, it is important to be able to measure and
quantify the services provided to consumers and to
separate these figures in terms of user sectors. Thus,
the WSA is required to subdivide their consumers
into specific user sectors, with each sector consisting
of consumers with similar consumption patterns e.g.
residential, commercial, industrial etc. Through the
separation and measurement of supply to these sectors,
the WSA is able to record the total quantity of water
services used by each user sector. This information
would enable WSAs to monitor whether resources
are being allocated on an equitable basis and would
assist in determining the tariff structure.46
Section 4(1) of the Norms and Standards states that a
water services institution must, when setting tariffs for
water services provided to consumers and other users
within its area of jurisdiction, differentiate, where
applicable, between at least the following categories:
(a) water supply services to households; (b) industrial
use of water supplied through a water services work;
(c) water supply services other than those specified
in paragraphs (a) and (b); (d) sanitation services to
households; (e) discharge of industrial effluent to a
sewage treatment plant; and (f) sanitation services
other than those specified in paragraphs (d) and
(e). The purpose of this regulation is to allow for
45 Section 6(2) of the Norms and Standards for Water
Services Tariffs: Regulations under section 10 of the
Water Services Act (Act 108 of 1997) (Norms and
Standards).
46 Regulation 10(2) of the Regulations relating to
Compulsory National Standards and Measures to
Conserve Water (8 June 2001) (Compulsory National
Standards).
FOUR Key Concepts in Water Services Provision
Water Services Fault Lines
24
differentiation of tariffs between different categories
of users.
At the local government level, chapter 8 of the
Municipal Systems Act regulates municipal services
and section 74 deals with service tariffs. According
to the Municipal Systems Act, a municipal council
must adopt a tariff policy that reflects a number of
principles.47 One of these principles in section 74(2)
(c) of the Act states that “poor households must have
access to at least basic services through i) tariffs that
cover only O/M costs, ii) special tariffs or life line
tariffs for low levels of use or consumption of services
or for basic levels of service; or (iii) any other direct
or indirect method of subsidisation of tariffs for poor
households.”48 Also, a tariff policy may differentiate
between different categories of users, debtors, service
providers, services, service standards, geographical
areas and other matters as long as the differentiation
does not amount to unfair discrimination.
Within this legislative and policy framework, however,
a vast range of different tariffs exist across South
Africa, both within and across municipalities. In some
cases tariffs are admirably pro-poor, however in other
cases, as outlined in part 5.4, they are not.
4.8. Indigent Policy
Due to the level of unemployment and poverty
within municipal areas, there are both households
and citizens who are unable to access or pay for basic
services; this grouping is referred to as the “indigent”.
A municipality therefore needs to develop and adopt
an indigent policy to ensure that the indigent can
have access to the package of services included in the
FBS programme.
49
Section 104(1)(a) of the Municipal Systems Act
states that the Minister may make regulations or issue
guidelines to provide for or regulate the development
47 See section 74 of the Municipal Systems Act 32 of 2000
(Municipal Systems Act) for a list of these principles.
48 DWAF, Strategic Framework, p. 33.
49 DPLG, Guidelines, p. 14.
and implementation of an indigent policy. In 2005,
the DPLG published its “Framework for a Municipal
Indigent Policy”, as well as the “Guidelines for the
Implementation of the National Indigent Policy by
Municipalities” (Guidelines). The policy framework
is meant to provide a foundation upon which
municipalities can build their own indigent policies, as
well as to provide a basis for actions which national
government will take in terms of the constitutional
responsibilities municipalities are given to ensure that
all have acceptable access to basic municipal services.50
The guidelines were drawn up to assist municipalities
with the implementation of their indigent policies as
defined within the national indigent framework.
Municipalities must decide how they are going to
implement their indigent policy as per the national
guidelines; however the DPLG has acknowledged
that municipalities have experienced many difficulties
in implementing indigent policies to date. These
problems include: deciding whether to define
beneficiaries in terms of households, account holders
or citizens; defining what constitutes a household;
defining who qualifies as indigent; targeting methods;
accessing non-account holders; administrative burdens
on the municipality; verifying application details; lack
of funds to implement the FBS programme; and
finally, assessing the real impact the FBS programme
is having on the quality of life of the beneficiaries.51
These problems are discussed further in part 5.3.
50 DPLG, “Framework for a Municipal Indigent Policy.”
Draft (September 2005), p. 1: http://fbs.dplg.gov.za/
fbs/site/docs/DocumentLibrary/IP/Policy.pdf.
51 DPLG, Guidelines, pp. 16-17.
During our interviews with local officials from the
fifteen municipalities, several recurring themes and
problematic areas were identified. We have covered
these issues in this part under ‘fault lines.’ The nine
fault lines identified and elaborated on here are:
5.1. Eliminating Backlogs and Improving Levels
of Service
5.2. Free Basic Services (FBS)
5.3. Indigent Policy as the FBS Targeting
Mechanism
5.4. Tariffs
5.5. Credit Control Enforcement - Water
Disconnections and Restriction Devices
5.6. Financial and Technical Assistance
5.7. Water Quality
5.8. Water Demand Management (WDM)
5.9. Public Participation.
These fault lines do not cover all issues relating to the
municipal provision of water services - particularly in
rural areas, which we have not investigated as fully
as urban areas - however, they are the cross-cutting
themes that emerged from the interviews and research.
We believe they are areas that impact greatly on access
to water and sanitation and each requires further in-
depth analysis.
5.1. Eliminating Backlogs and
Improving Levels of Service
Eliminating backlogs, meaning extending water
services to those with none, and improving levels of
service, meaning providing increasingly better levels of
service to those with rudimentary access (referred to
as ‘stepping up the water ladder’ by DWAF), are vital
aspects of water services provision across South Africa.
These objectives are in line with the formulation of
section 27 of the Constitution, which guarantees
everyone’s right of access to sufficient water (broadly
equating with the eliminating backlogs component)
and demands the progressive realisation of the right
of access to sufficient water within available resources
(broadly equating with the improving levels of service
component). According to the section on ‘the water
ladder’ in the Strategic Framework:
National government is committed to eliminating the
backlog in basic water services and to progressively
improving levels of service over time in line with the
original aims of the Reconstruction and Development
Programme in 1994. The first step up the water
ladder is the provision of at least a basic water and
sanitation service to all people living in South Africa.
This is the most important policy priority and
government will commit adequate funds to make
this possible within the next few years. The next
step is an intermediate level of service such as a tap
in the yard. Water services authorities are expected
to assist communities to achieve intermediate and
higher levels of service wherever practical, affordable
and sustainable without compromising the national
policy priority of universal access to at least a basic
level of service. National government will increase
its commitment of grant funds over time to support
households to step up the services ladder. Basic levels
of service will also be reviewed in future to consider
increasing the basic level from 25 to 50 litres per
person.
52
52 DWAF, Strategic Framework, p. ii.
Five
Fault Lines
Fault Lines
FIVE
25
Water Services Fault Lines
26
bias. Throughout the Water Dialogues case studies
the researchers found a stark contrast between
service provision in rural and urban areas, and while
for the most part this has a strong basis in historical
inequities, there is evidence that urban areas are still
being prioritised over rural areas.53
According to eThekwini, the municipality has a
backlog for water of 55,432 households (6.72 percent)
and for sanitation of 210,087 households (25.48
percent). According to the municipality, it is currently
confirming the nature and extent of the backlogs in
service delivery across the entire metropolitan area,
and a significant amount of verification work is
needed to determine accurate backlog numbers for all
engineering services and to put together a coordinated
plan for eradicating these backlogs over a period of
time. According to Amathole District Municipality, a
2007 study done on backlogs in Amathole found that
there are a total of 309,000 people (31,8 percent) who
still do not have a basic level provision of water, and
approximately 82 percent who do not have access to
a basic level of sanitation. In Madibeng, the backlog
for water is approximately 20,850 households (20.75
percent), and for sanitation it is 41,824 households
(41.63 percent). Albert Luthuli Municipality has a
huge sanitation backlog, with about 62 percent of the
municipal area below the basic level of sanitation. In Dr
J.S. Moroka Municipality, approximately 75 percent
of households are connected to water and 25 percent
to sanitation. According to the municipality, the
backlog for water is 5,086 households at an estimated
cost of R30.5 million to eradicate and the backlog
for sanitation is 41,008 households at an estimated
cost of R155.8 million to eradicate. The municipality
stated that the levels of service provided are ultimately
linked to issues of cost-recovery and sustainability and
that it would take about ten years to eradicate water
backlogs and twenty years to eradicate sanitation
53 The Water Dialogues, “Preliminary Discussion
Document on Cross Cutting Issues from WD-SA’s
Ugu, Ilembe and Bushbuckridge Pilot Case Studies.”
(October 2008), p. 37.
This fault line deals with systemic barriers to
eliminating backlogs and improving levels of service,
which were identified by municipalities. It should be
noted that, particularly in relation to water services
for the poor, there are substantial overlaps between
this part and part 5.2 on FBS. However, because there
is a distinction between getting connected to water
services infrastructure (physical access, described in
this part) and being able to enjoy the services even
if you are very poor (economic access, as advanced
through FBS, outlined in part 5.2), we have analysed
these issues over two parts.
All municipalities mentioned backlogs and improving
levels of service as major challenges. A persistent
problem is that many households have poor access
to water, are still using unacceptable methods of
sanitation, and are without the prospect of improving
their levels of service in the foreseeable future.
Furthermore, the reality is that women bear the burden
of carrying water from rivers and streams when there is
an inadequate water supply. Thus providing adequate
access to water services plays a critical role in attempts
to promote both socio-economic and gender equality.
This fault line examines:
delays in water and sanitation provision;
adequacy of water and sanitation supply; and
problems with third party or intermediary
control of water supply in the context of rural
farm workers and dwellers and inner city tenants.
5.1.1. Delays in providing water and
sanitation
Levels of water services provision are largely determined
by the typology and geography of human settlements.
The largest backlogs experienced in South Africa,
apart from those living in informal settlements, exist
in municipalities with large rural populations or many
households living in isolated or scattered villages. A
preliminary discussion document on cross-cutting
issues in water services provision by The Water
Dialogues, found that the scale of backlogs in rural
areas, and the systemic incentives for municipalities
to prioritise urban areas, result in continued urban
27
backlogs. Lepelle-Nkumpi echoed this sentiment,
stating that, realistically, it would take them more
than twenty years to eradicate water and sanitation
backlogs. At their current rate of implementation of
only 162 households per village for 15 villages, they
can only eradicate approximately 1,620 households
per year. The question remains how they will be able
to eradicate a backlog of over 50,000 households with
increasing development taking place and an ever-
shifting mark.
During our research we found many discrepancies
in backlog statistics among the data provided by
municipalities, Stats SA and DWAF. For example,
according to Dr J.S. Moroka Municipality, it has a water
backlog of 5,086 households and a sanitation backlog
of 41,008 households. According to Stats SA figures,
taken from Gaffney’s Local Government in South Africa
2007-2008, the municipality has 13,939 households
without access to water and 31,774 households without
access to sanitation. According to DWAF’s Water
Services National Information System (WS NIS), as
of April 2008 the municipality has a water backlog of
12,142 households and a sanitation backlog of 40,807
households (measured as households below RDP level
of service).54 The backlogs data available appears to be
generally unreliable, which is highly problematic given
that municipalities’ water services planning is based on
these backlogs statistics, as is external funding like the
MIG allocation.
5.1.2. Adequacy of water and
sanitation supply
While some municipalities are still struggling to
connect households to water and sanitation grids/
systems, many more municipalities are not making
54 DWAF, Water Services National Information System
(WS NIS): http://www.dwaf.gov.za/dir_ws/wsnis/
default.asp?nStn=pg_BuildReports&usersel=true&Pr
ov=MP&curlevelid=1&wsacode=MP&curPerspectiv
eID=2. Accessed 20 October 2008.
much progress in ensuring adequate levels of basic
water supply and sanitation – water on-site or in the
yard and water-borne sanitation. When we asked
if local communities were given a choice of their
level of water service, Lepelle-Nkumpi municipality
stated that communal standpipes are being used until
everyone reaches the RDP level of service, and if people
can afford to put in a metered tap they may do so,
however the municipality discourages the connection
of yard taps because it diverts attention away from
addressing backlogs. This is problematic as it means
that people are stuck with communal standpipes and
are not able to move up ‘the water ladder’ because the
municipality’s only focus is on addressing backlogs
as opposed to improving levels of service. Meeting a
minimum level for all is critical, but it is not sufficient
for demonstrating that all available resources are
being used for progressive realisation of the right to
water and sanitation. The adequacy of the basic water
services provided in poor areas, if indeed it is provided,
is examined further under the analysis of FBW in part
5.2.
In informal settlements, water from communal
standpipes is commonly not charged for, as it is
assumed that households have difficulty carrying
more than 6kl water per month and thus count this
as FBW. In the case of sanitation, in rural villages it
is often the norm for households to make do with
Ventilated Improved Pit (VIP) toilets for sanitation
and boreholes for water. In informal settlements,
a communal standpipe and the bucket system (or
‘pail system’ as it is called in Nelson Mandela Bay)
is often used, and the bucket system of sanitation is
unfortunately still practiced by many throughout
South Africa. It is often argued that dry systems such
as VIP toilets are an adequate form of sanitation.
However, some question the appropriateness of ‘dry
systems’ for humid environments where, in fact,
faecal matter does not easily dry. A further problem
with VIPs is that they need to be emptied regularly
by the municipality, which often does not happen.
Fault Lines
FIVE
Water Services Fault Lines
28
Dr J.S. Moroka Municipality has a high sanitation
backlog of over 41,000 households and a water supply
backlog of about 5,000 households. The municipality
stated that the installation of water-borne sanitation
systems is not advised due to the increase in water
demand and the limitation of the O/M capability of
the municipality, and that where these systems have
already been installed, cost-recovery and revenue
collection must be implemented and enforced.
However, Kathy Eales notes that –
Many VIPs are now full and unusable. In many
areas, VIPS are now called full-ups. Some pits were
too small, or were fully sealed…. South Africa’s
household sanitation policy is grossly inadequate. It
speaks primarily to dry systems, and does not clarify
roles and responsibilities around what to do when pits
are full. National government under-estimated the
scale of technical support required.
55
This suggests such systems are not necessarily more
affordable, and the key issue is prioritisation. In
May 2008, the Department of Water Affairs in the
Western Cape announced that it had successfully
eradicated the use of the bucket system in all formal
areas in its municipalities. DWAF has spent R57
million in the Western Cape to eradicate the bucket
system in formal areas and to get rid of its sanitation
backlogs and at the announcement of its success, a
DWAF spokesperson was quoted as saying: “One of
the reasons for the backlog is that sanitation has not
been regarded as a priority, thus the need to raise the
profile of sanitation in order to change the mindsets
of municipalities and communities through advocacy
programmes and campaigns.”56 South Africa’s
55 Amisi, B., Bond, P., Khumalo, D. and Nojiyeza, S.,
“The neoliberal loo” (18 February 2008): http://www.
ukzn.ac.za/ccs/default.asp?2,40,5,1514. Accessed 15
October 2008.
56 Breytenbach, K., “No more bucket system for
Cape.” IOL (27 May 2008): http://www.iol.
co.za/index.php?set_id=1&click_id=124&art_
id=vn20080527055659107C192455. Accessed 15
October 2008.
National Sanitation Week was held in May 2008,
coinciding with 2008 being the International Year of
Sanitation by the United Nations.57 Indeed, raising
the profile and the importance of adequate sanitation
is imperative, and more research and creative thinking
needs to be encouraged in this sphere of water services
provision.
A structural difficulty in going beyond a very basic level
of service is the current policy setting, where water
services provision is intrinsically bound with that of
the housing delivery process and the formalisation of
townships and informal settlements through National
Department of Housing or provincial and/or local
government housing projects. Those living in informal
settlements are often left at a basic or minimum level
of service for a long period of time while they wait to
be allocated to a new formal housing project, or until in
situ upgrading is completed.58 The national “Upgrading
of Informal Settlements” housing programme, as set
out in Chapter 13 of the National Housing Code,59
has unfortunately been slow to get off the ground at
both the national and local level, and has left millions
of poor households living in limbo, in shacks without
access to electricity or adequate water and sanitation.
The programme states that “public sector investment
within informal settlements is restricted as a result of
the illegal status of settlements. Informal settlements
accordingly lack access to basic municipal engineering
services such as water, sanitation, electricity, roads
57 SA: Hendricks: Launch of National Sanitation Week.”
Polity (26 May 2008): http://www.polity.org.za/
article.php?a_id=134226. Accessed 15 October 2008.
58 Basic, minimum or RDP level of service generally refers
to a communal standpipe of a distance no more than
200m from the house or stand.
59 National Department Of Housing, “National
Housing Programme: Upgrading Of Informal
Settlements.” Chapter 13 of the National
Housing Code (October 2004): http://web.wits.
ac.za/NR/rdonlyres/74FBBB09-90B0-40CE-
A04D-A60BCA2E18C4/0/Ch13finalversion
19Oct2004InfSettleUpgrProgr.pdf.
29
and walkways and lighting. Most informal settlements
also typically lack government-funded social amenities
and economic infrastructure. For the same reason,
inhabitants of these settlements had no incentive to
date to invest their own resources in the areas.”60 The
fact that this programme has not taken off and that
municipalities have generally been unwilling to invest
time and money to extend services to these so-called
‘informal’ and ‘illegal’ areas, is highly problematic.
The aim to eradicate informal settlements by 2014
has been a controversial element of housing politics
at national, provincial and municipal level throughout
South Africa, and according to Huchzermeyer, many
governments, including South Africa, have failed to
differentiate between the normative principle of the
slogan ‘cities without slums’, and the operational target
of improving the lives of shackdwellers, a fundamental
part of which extends to water services provision.61
According to Ekurhuleni, they are facing a major
problem in that as people are moved from informal
settlements into formal housing, more people simply
occupy their stands and the backlog of services
remains constant despite the municipality’s best
efforts. Their policy for formalising service provision
remains that services are provided through the
provincial department’s housing programme to
formally developed housing areas. The municipality
stated that in terms of sanitation provision in informal
settlements, most households have access to self-dug
pit latrines. A Roll-Out Plan (part of the Department
of Housing’s Migration Plan) is in place and by 2011
and 2014 the provision of informal settlements with
water and sanitation should be complete. For those
in need of sanitation post-2010, dry sanitation will
be provided. However, a major problem is that when
people are eventually allocated free or subsidised
60 Ibid., para. 13.3.1, p. 10.
61 Huchzermeyer, M., “Uplift slums, don’t destroy them.”
The Mercury (12 July 2007): http://www.themercury.
co.za/index.php?fArticleId=3928976. Accessed 15
October 2008.
government houses, it is often the case that they cannot
afford to pay for the services which are provided with
the house, and are subsequently disconnected or
restricted through credit control processes, and must
look elsewhere to meet their water and sanitation
needs.
Integrating housing policies and plans with those
of water services within municipalities is supposed
to be undertaken through the IDP, which should
ideally incorporate and align the water services plan as
described in the WSDP and the housing sector plan
for the municipality.
5.1.3. Problems with third party control
of water supply
Another major structural problem regarding the
elimination of backlogs is that many people are living
in situations where their water services are governed
and controlled by an intermediary or third party that
is not the local authority. There are many cases where
people who qualify for FBS cannot access water or
sanitation services because they are mediated through
a third party that controls the relationship between
them and the municipality or WSA. This generally
occurs in two situations: in rural or farming areas
where farm workers and dwellers living on privately-
owned farms are reliant on the farmer for their water
supply; and in urban centres and inner cities where
tenants living in flats are reliant on their landlords as
an intermediary for their water supply, or ‘unlawful
occupiers’ who have no relationship with the WSA
because they are living in collapsed sectional title units
or in buildings with absentee landlords.
DWAF has a 2005 document entitled “Ensuring
Water Services To Residents On Privately Owned
Land: A Guide for Municipalities” which deals with
issues around providing water and sanitation services
on privately owned land in a range of contexts,
including: commercial farms, game parks, mine
owned land, church owned land, industrial owned
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Water Services Fault Lines
30
allow the municipality to provide water and sanitation
on the private property, the protocol is to provide a
communal standpipe and a VIP toilet just outside of
the property. In Cape Winelands District Municipality
the strategy is to financially incentivise farm owners
to improve the water and sanitation facilities available
to farm workers resident on their farms via the Rural
Subsidy Scheme. A farmer for example, would provide
water and build a sanitation structure, which would
subsequently be investigated by health inspectors. The
municipality claims they have taken action against
some farmers for not providing water and sanitation
after an inspection, which has included writing letters
and taking a few farmers to court, however the extent
to which farmers are effectively monitored in their
provision of adequate water services to those living on
their property is unclear.
In urban and inner city scenarios, the intermediary
is generally an absentee owner or a landlord through
which poor tenants or ‘unlawful occupiers’ living in
sectional title buildings (often ‘collapsed’) or rental
apartments are meant to liaise in order to obtain
(at least) FBS from the municipality. The lack of
implementable and enforceable guidelines to regulate
these relationships is a major hindrance to extending
people’s access to adequate water and sanitation.64 It
is acknowledged that reaching and providing services
to groups such as farm workers and dwellers and
inner city unlawful occupiers is difficult, however it is
essential to meet the water services needs of everyone in
South Africa, particularly vulnerable and marginalised
groupings.
64 For more on the structural difficulties in accessing
FBS in inner city scenarios, see Wafer, A., Dugard, J.,
Ngwenya, M. and Sibanda, S., “A tale of six buildings:
the lived-reality of poor people’s access to basic services
in Johannesburg’s inner city.” Centre for Applied Legal
Studies (April 2008): http://web.wits.ac.za/Academic/
Centres/CALS/BasicServices/ResearchReports.htm.
land including privately owned enterprises, and
sectional title/residential complexes and estates.62
Each municipality is meant to conduct a municipal
survey of “privately owned land”, profile residents on
such land, assess current levels of service and identify
the “water services intermediary.” Each municipality
should also allocate funding for provision, including
accessing MIG grants, set by-laws to regulate
relationships, and monitor and regulate water services
intermediaries. However, these guidelines are generally
not being implemented adequately, and worse still,
municipalities interviewed were simply not aware of
the existence of the guidelines. In the meantime, those
living on farms and in collapsed sectional title units or
buildings with absentee landlords continue to suffer.
These are often the most vulnerable and marginalised
people for whom FBS are a necessity.
It is also notable that a report published by the
Department of Land Affairs (DLA) considers these
guidelines as only a part solution in land reform
situations: “on further scrutiny they do not appear
to provide a sustainable solution for service provision
on privately owned land acquired through the land
reform programme…The challenge for DLA, in
conjunction with the local authority and DWAF, is to
find the correct and most appropriate route to ensure
that municipal services are delivered to land reform
projects with a settlement component.”63
In farming areas the intermediary is often the farmer
on whose land farm workers or dwellers reside, and
who is largely responsible for water and sanitation
provision. Msunduzi stated that one of their biggest
challenges has been the delivery of basic services
to farm lands. In farming areas, if farmers refuse to
62 DWAF, “Ensuring Water Services To Residents On
Privately Owned Land: A Guide for Municipalities.”
Version 1 (July 2005): http://www.dwaf.gov.za/
Documents/Other/WS/POLGuidelinesJun05.pdf.
63 Sustainable Development Consortium, “Settlement
and Implementation Support (SIS) Strategy for Land
and Agrarian Reform in South Africa.” Department
of Land Affairs, Commission on Restitution of Land
Rights, Belgian Development Cooperation and Belgian
Technical Cooperation. (2007), chapter 9.
31
5.1.4. Conclusion and recommenda-
tions on eliminating backlogs
and improving levels of service
In many ways the most difficult fault line – the challenge
to eradicate backlogs and improve levels of water and
sanitation provision – is the easiest to conclude. It
is clear that there is an urgent need to ensure that
everyone has access to adequate and sufficient water
and sanitation provision. Indeed, surely there can be
no more pressing priority for South Africa, suggesting
that all resources, financial and technical, should be
focused on achieving this goal. Ensuring everyone’s
access to water services promotes human development
and health, as well as gender equality.
5.2. Free Basic Services (FBS)
The introduction of Free Basic Services (FBS) around
2001 brought to an end, at least on paper, the situation
in which water and sanitation infrastructure had been
extended to poor communities (in other words, the
backlog had been addressed), but poor people were
still unable to access water services because of not
being able to afford water bills (in cases of water-borne
sanitation, their sanitation services were also adversely
affected). While the FBS policy was largely politically
motivated (it was announced in the run-up to the
municipal elections in 2000), it did provide the basis
for a more progressive approach towards water services
provision, in which the right of access to adequate and
sufficient water and sanitation is acknowledged to be
about economic as well as physical access. However,
the reality is that municipalities have faced many
difficulties with its implementation, and at present
FBSan only exists in an ad hoc manner, differing
greatly from municipality to municipality. According
to the DPLG, 74 percent of indigent households with
infrastructure had access to FBW, as of April 2007.
While this figure is in any event highly unlikely, the
fact is that many indigent households do not have
access to adequate infrastructure, and even when they
can access FBS, the provision is often insufficient or
comes with punitive conditionalities. This fault line
deals with the provision of FBS. We have identified
the following problems:
the absence of FBS provision within some
municipalities;
insufficient or inappropriate FBS provision; and
punitive conditionalities placed on poor
households to access FBS.
5.2.1. Absence of FBS provision
As outlined in part 4.6, there is still no FBSan policy
in place, which is highly problematic and results in an
extremely ad hoc and inequitable approach to FBSan at
the municipal level. In terms of FBW, according to the
FBW Implementation Strategy, every poor household
should receive 6kl FBW per month. Notwithstanding
problems with sufficiency and targeting (discussed
below), there are many municipalities which are
admirably implementing the FBW policy. However,
worryingly, there are clearly still municipalities,
generally rural and under-resourced, which are not
providing any FBW or FBSan to poor households
within their jurisdiction. This is obviously tied in
closely with levels of service, as discussed in part 5.1,
and often the lack of sophisticated infrastructure
and water and sanitation delivery mechanisms in
rural areas prevent an accurate metered allocation of
FBW and FBSan. Communal standpipes or diesel
pump boreholes are generally used in these areas. It
is clear that the provision of FBSan is a specific, and
major, problem, with many municipalities simply not
providing any FBSan to the poor.
Through our research we discovered that Dr J.S.
Moroka Municipality was not providing any FBW
or FBSan, despite the fact that it had a FBS policy
in place and acknowledged the strategic importance of
providing FBS. It seems that while municipalities often
have a FBS policy in place, they often have no means
of implementing it, and the implementation of the
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Water Services Fault Lines
32
month,65 and eThekwini which is increasing its FBW
amount to 9kl/month for indigent households. These
are all relatively large and well-resourced metropolitan
municipalities.
When it comes to largely poor and under-resourced
municipalities, the 6kl per household per month
minimum amount has effectively become the maximum
in terms of the FBW provision, where it is provided at
all. As has been mentioned above, the national FBW
policy accepts that 6kl per household per month
(working on an average household of eight persons)
or 25 litres per person per day is sufficient, however
DWAF has acknowledged that this should ideally be
increased to 12kl per household per month or 50 litres
per person per day. This is the amount that the RDP
stipulated as a medium term goal and international
experts have stated that 25 litres per person per day is
insufficient water to lead a healthy and dignified life,
especially for people living with HIV/AIDS. Thus,
the general consensus is that the FBW amount should
be increased accordingly, at least to a minimum of 50
litres per person per day.
An area of concern is the allocation of FBW on a per
household basis, which is the norm. In poor areas there
are often more than eight people living in the main
house, and there are typically backyard dwellers living
on the property, thus it is often the case that many
residents are excluded in the determination of the 6kl
per household per month allocation. In Mazibuko,
Johannesburg High Court Judge Tsoka found that Phiri
households consist of on average minimum persons of
16, and that in Phiri the number of residents per yard
far outnumber members of a household because there
are more informal settlers in a yard than members of
a household. According to Judge Tsoka, “this means
65 In Cape Town, 6kl of FBW is provided to indigents
as well as a R30 grant, which purchases approximately
2.8kl. In addition, the city provides 4.2kl of free sewerage.
Thus, the net result is that indigent households are able
to consume 13kl free water per month (8.8kl of water
and 4.2kl of sewerage).
policy is not enforced. According to its 2007 WSDP,
the FBW initiative in Dr J.S. Moroka Municipality
has not been successfully implemented and they are
putting in place measures to increase those on the
indigent register so as to procure more funding via ES,
as well as to ensure those not registered as indigent
pay for the consumption of water. Moses Kotane
Municipality provides 6kl of FBW to everyone but
there appears to be no FBSan provision, and Blouberg
also provides no FBSan. When asked about FBSan
provision, municipal officials often referred to the
free installation and maintenance of VIP toilets, the
provision of the bucket system for free, or slightly
lower flat rates on sewerage as evidence of FBSan.
provision
As has been mentioned, some municipalities are still
not providing FBS to poor households, however
there are many that are and this is encouraging. But
there are problems relating to the sufficiency and
appropriateness of FBS provision.
The national FBW policy assumes that 6kl per
household per month (working on an average
household of eight persons) or 25 litres per person per
day is sufficient, however DWAF has acknowledged
that this should ideally be increased to 12kl per
household per month or 50 litres per person per day. It
is clear that some of the better resourced metropolitan
municipalities are taking the initiative to increase their
FBW allocation to indigents, but others remain stuck
at the minimum level.
It is up to municipalities whether to provide the
minimum FBW universally to all households, whether
to target poor households and provide them with
more FBW and if so, how to target the poor. Seven
of the municipalities in our study provide 6kl FBW
per month to all households, regardless of income.
Examples of municipalities who are providing more
than the 6kl per household per month to indigents
include Ekurhuleni which provides 9kl/month, Nelson
Mandela Metropolitan which provides 8kl/month,
City of Cape Town which provides an effective 9kl/
33
therefore that many residents of a yard are excluded
in the determination of the 25 litre per person per day
or 6kl per household per month. They have no access
to water at all.”66 There are clearly problems with the
‘per household per month’ allocation of FBW, which
is wholly inappropriate, especially for large, urban and
for multi-dwelling households.
It is important to note that the failure to finalise a
FBSan policy impacts water usage in households
with water-borne sanitation. Such households are
forced to utilise the majority of their FBW allocation
for sanitation, leaving insufficient water for drinking,
bathing, washing and food preparation. In light of
this, there should at least be a FBSan policy for people
who have water-borne sanitation. In our research,
we found that at present it is only the metropolitan
municipalities who are providing this, with Ekurhuleni
providing 6kl FBSan to all residents, and Nelson
Mandela Bay providing 11kl, Stellenbosch providing
6kl and Cape Town providing 4.2kl of FBSan per
month to registered indigents. EThekwini provides
free sewerage to those with property value less than
R36,000, and has a system of rising block rebates which
are granted to properties valued between R36,000 and
R100,000.
5.2.3. Punitive conditions to accessing
FBS
A disturbing trend witnessed in several municipalities
is the requirement for poor households to agree
to certain water restricting devices, including flow
restrictors and prepayment meters (PPMs) in order to
qualify as indigent and access FBS (see part 5.3.3 for
more on the burdensome requirements for indigent
status). As discussed in part 5.5 on credit control
enforcement, flow restrictors and PPMs restrict access
to water to unacceptable levels.
66 Mazibuko judgment, at note 33, para. 168.
5.2.4. Conclusion and
recommendations on FBS
At present FBS are provided in an ad hoc manner
by municipalities, with widely varying compliance
with national standards. Some municipalities do not
supply FBS at all and some supply only the minimum
FBW amount without any FBSan. The lack of any
real national monitoring or enforcement by DWAF
of the implementation of its FBW policy at the local
level, as well as the absence of a FBSan policy, is
highly problematic. There is clearly an urgent need for
DWAF to formulate a FBSan policy and to monitor
and enforce it. Linked to the goals of eradicating
backlogs and improving levels of service, such a policy
should determine what kinds of sanitation services are
deemed appropriate for particular environments and
municipalities should be encouraged to provide the
best possible sanitation services with the best possible
FBSan.
In addition, in relation to FBW, DWAF must follow
up on its claims in its 2002 FBW Implementation
Strategy, that it would identify, treat as ‘special
cases’ and give their highest level of support to those
municipalities which could not implement the FBW
policy by July 2003. This was over five years ago and
yet in some municipalities poor people still cannot
access even the minimal FBW amount. While national
policy is in place, there is as yet no clear enforcement
of the policy or national assistance to implement at the
local level.
There is also a need for DWAF to oversee and, if
necessary, assist municipalities to move away from
the very minimal amounts of FBW, towards a more
internationally recognised standard. International
experts, Judge Tsoka in the Mazibuko judgment, as
well as DWAF itself, have all confirmed that 50 litres
per person per day is the minimum amount of water
needed to sustain a healthy and dignified life, and all
efforts should be made to ensure that every person
in the country has access to this amount, and the
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Water Services Fault Lines
34
progressive realisation of access to more water in the
case of poor households, particularly if households
have water-borne sanitation (in which case the 50 lcd
is not sufficient). In order to ensure that household
allocation of water corresponds with household size,
a housing size census should be undertaken every
couple of years. Furthermore, there should be non-
burdensome special representation mechanisms in
place, which are advertised widely, for input in the
interim period as well as for vulnerable groups like
people living with HIV/AIDS. Finally, access to FBS
should not be linked to compulsory installation of
water restriction devices.
5.3. Indigent Policy as the FBS
Targeting Mechanism
In almost all the municipalities interviewed, FBW and
FBSan are administered through an indigent policy.
Of the fifteen municipalities interviewed, twelve said
they had indigent policies – Dr J.S. Moroka said it
had a policy but it had not been implemented, Nelson
Mandela Bay had the equivalent which it called its
Assistance to the Poor Policy and eThekwini was
in the process of finalising its policy but had a social
package which provided FBS to poor households.
Cape Winelands did not have an indigent policy.
There are a number of problems identified with this
manner of targeting and allocating FBS to people.
These issues are highlighted in this fault line and
include:
p
roblems with defining the poor and the narrow
definition of ‘indigent’;
the ineffectiveness of such targeting to reach
those in need, as evidenced by the chronic under-
representation of those who actually qualify
(i.e. the low number of formally qualifying poor
people who are successfully registered and receive
benefits); and
the onerous administrative process to apply as an
indigent, and the adverse consequences of being
on the indigent register.
indigent
Through our research we discovered that, across the
municipalities, quite different ‘objective’ criteria are
used to define the poor for the purposes of compiling
an indigent register, which is the main mechanism
through which FBSs are allocated. This is problematic
as in some municipalities it is evident that there are
relatively poor people who do not qualify but who
would benefit greatly from FBS. Nelson Mandela Bay
officials stated that their definition of who the poor
comprise is limited and the reality is that those who
suffer the most are those just outside of the definition,
but who still cannot afford the services. Indeed, using
an indigent register to allocate FBS leaves a potentially
very large ‘black hole’ comprising those who are poor
but do not qualify as indigents or those who for
whatever reason do not register for indigent status.
The DPLG itself has acknowledged that indigent
thresholds differ from municipality to municipality
and that this creates much confusion.67
The municipalities interviewed use varied methods
to identify the poor or those qualifying for indigent
status. Moses Kotane, Madibeng, Lepelle-Nkumpi
and Amathole use income equal or less than R1,100/
month; Dr J.S. Moroka uses income equal or less
than R800/month; Albert Luthuli (R1,880/month),
Nelson Mandela (R1,770/month) and Cape Town
(R1,700/month) use income equal or less than two
state pensions per month; Msunduzi uses income
equal or less than R2,036/month as well as property
and land value; Stellenbosch uses income equal or
less than R2,100/month; Cape Winelands uses
income equal or less than R1 600/month; Witzenberg
defines poor as households earning less than four
67 DPLG, “Towards The Successful Implementation Of
The Free Basic Services Communication Strategy.”
Workshop Report (Pretoria, 18 July 2007), p. 5: http://
www.participation.org.za/docs/tsi.doc.
35
times the old age and disability grants and indigent
as households earning less than twice the old age and
disability grant; Nelson Mandela Bay uses property
value less than certain amounts (these differ per area);
Cape Town uses property value less than R199,000;
and eThekwini use property value less than R100,000.
The wide spread of income thresholds for indigency
can be seen in figure 1 below.
None of the indigent policies mentioned a contingency
policy for those who are just outside of the classification
of indigent for whatever reason, but who still require
the benefits thereof. In Msunduzi Municipality,
applied indigents (those earning total income less than
R2,036 per month) are charged R20.94 for 12kl per
household per month, while normal residential users
are charged R108.48.68 The implication of this is that
in a community one household could be registered
as indigent while another which earns approximately
the same income per month (but has not qualified as
indigent) will pay about R88.00 more per month to
consume the same amount of water. There is almost
a perverse incentive to remain below a certain income
to qualify for FBS, and the heavy penalties facing
those who perhaps begin to earn more per month
for whatever reason and do not declare this, are
counterproductive and pernicious.
68 See Appendix 7.2 for comparisons between what
indigents and non-indigents pay for 12/kl/month in
each municipality.
Fault Lines
FIVE
FIG. 1. INDIGENCY THRESHOLDS ACROSS MUNICIPALITIES
2500
2000
1500
1000
500
0
Rand
Dr J.S. Moroka
Vhembe
Moses Kotane
Madibeng
Lepelle-Nkumpi
Amathole
Cape Winelands
Cape Town
Nelson Mandela
Albert Luthuli
Witzenberg
Msunduzi
Stellenbosch
Series 1
Water Services Fault Lines
36
5.3.2. Ineffectiveness of using indigent
register as means to reach those
in need
A clear, and concerning, research finding is that, in
most municipalities, the number of registered indigents
is admitted to be grossly under-representative of those
who actually qualify and would greatly benefit from
this free allocation. The DPLG recently announced,
as one of its achievements, that 220 municipalities in
South Africa currently have indigent registers. Even
if this were true, which we find unlikely, it does not
capture the reality that most of these registers exist
only theory or are grossly under-representative, and
that there are myriad problems associated with the
indigent system of FBS allocation.69
Although the City of Johannesburg was not part of
our survey, as one of the most capacitated and well-
resourced municipalities in the country, its indigent
register experience is a useful indicator. Johannesburg’s
indigent register currently reflects 108,000 registered
households. Yet, according to household data from
Stats SA, as well as information from the City’s 2005
Human Development Strategy (which estimated that
half of the City’s households have a monthly income
of between R0 and R1,600), there are an estimated
500,000 households that formally qualify as indigent.
This means that, in spite of a decade of concerted
efforts by the City to register indigents (the City
of Johannesburg has had an indigent register since
1997), the register represents only about a fifth of
qualifying households. This, in itself, suggests that the
register is a wholly inappropriate means of alleviating
poverty, particularly where this is to be the City’s only
mechanism.
From our research across the 15 municipalities, it
is clear that registration drives have generally been
unsuccessful. The City of Tshwane Metropolitan
Municipality, for example, has recently embarked
on a major drive to update its register of indigent
69 DPLG, “Presentation to the Portfolio Committee: Free
Basic Services and Infrastructure Branch” by Mr Yusuf
Patel, Deputy Director-General (6 November 2007):
http://www.participation.org.za/docs/fb.ppt.
households. Its goal is to get 90,000 indigent
households registered, no mean feat considering since
1997 the council has only registered about 50,000
indigent households.70 The ability of under-resourced
and rural municipalities to achieve this kind of indigent
registering drive is obviously severely compromised
and means that thousands of deserving people simply
do not have access.71
Madibeng, Witzenberg, Nelson Mandela Bay,
Msunduzi and Moses Kotane all indicated that the
number of households registered is not an accurate
reflection of the actual number that qualify for
indigent status (the various criteria for qualification
are discussed below), and the rest did not provide
information. Moses Kotane only has 518 registered
indigent households out of a total of 63,000 households,
90 percent of which are rural-based. Msunduzi only
has 27,500 people registered as indigent and stated
that this is only about 20 percent of those who
qualify. Madibeng has 6,689 households registered
as indigent, out of a total of approximately 100,000
households, and it states this number is highly under-
representative because there is no reliable data for rural
areas. In Madibeng, roughly 70 percent of households
earn less than R1,600 a month, with approximately
23,000 of this number receiving no monthly income.
This means that 70,000 households are poor,
however only about 9 percent of these households
are registered as indigent! 72 Dr J.S. Moroka stated
that approximately 67 percent of total households
70 Mbanjwa, X., “Drive to register 90 000 indigent
families.” IOL (17 July 2008):http://www.iol.
co.za/index.php?set_id=1&click_id=124&art_
id=vn20080717061737707C511733. Accessed 15
October 2008.
71 CALS, “CALS comment on City of Johannesburg
proposed tariffs, FBW and FBE.” (25 April 2008), p.
2: http://web.wits.ac.za/Academic/Centres/CALS/
BasicServices/Advocacy.htm.
72 The Gaffney Group, Gaffney’s Local Government
in South Africa 2007-2008 Official Yearbook.
(Johannesburg, April 2007), pp. 929-930.
37
(35,900) can be considered indigent; however there is
no indigent register. In Nelson Mandela Bay, there are
93,739 households (34 percent of total households)
on its version of the indigent register, which it calls its
Assistance to the Poor Policy; however, as has been
stated above, according to the municipality this is not
an accurate figure because the definition of poor is
limited and those who suffer the most are those who
fall just outside the definition but who still cannot
afford the services. No municipality indicated that the
number of registered indigents is representative of the
number of poor people who formally qualify.
Most of the interviewed municipalities complained
that their main obstacle to better water services
provision is a lack of human capacity and financial
resources (this is covered in part 5.6). In this context it
is important to note that, if indigent registers were fully
accurate (incorporating everyone who qualifies), this
would greatly increase the administrative and financial
demands on municipalities that are already unable
to cope. According to Dr J.S. Moroka Municipality,
income from the sale of water is severely restricted as
the vast majority of households are considered to be
indigent. It is not far-fetched to assume that the large
number of qualifying households, the cost (financial
and staffing capacity) to administer the register of
indigent households, and the loss of revenue from
billing, combine to act as a deterrent for municipalities
to maintain a representative register of qualified
indigents. In sum, the disincentives of increased
costs and decreased internal revenue result in under-
representative indigent registers.
5.3.3. Onerous administrative process
to apply as an indigent, and
adverse consequences of being
on the register
The application process for indigent status and the
requirements for indigent qualification are generally
very onerous and exclusionary. In most municipalities,
in order to qualify, you must:
be a municipal account-holder (this excludes
most poor tenants and certainly excludes
informal occupiers who also have housing rights
and the right of access to sufficient water);
have a total household monthly income less
than a certain amount (this differs widely across
municipalities, generally in the range of between
R800 and R2 100 per month);
have a South African identity document (ID)
(this excludes many undocumented poor and
vulnerable people).
Most municipalities require extensive documentation
and ‘proof of poverty’ in order to qualify for indigent
status. For example, in Moses Kotane Municipality
occupiers must have a South African ID or application
for a new ID and provide their latest municipal
account; have an application form indicating the names
and identity numbers of all occupants/residents over
the age of 18 years who reside at the property; and
provide proof of income, a letter from employer(s) or
proof of pension or disability/maintenance grant. For
example, according to Stellenbosch Municipality, the
maximum income level to qualify for indigency status
is equal or less than two times the state grant plus
20 percent and rounded up to the nearest hundred
rand. Proof must be produced in the form of pay
slips, unemployment certificates, income certificates
or other acceptable proof of income. Should proof of
income not be available, income may be declared by
means of a sworn statement. Such applications will
however only be considered after a full investigation
by means of a socio-economic survey.
Often, occupiers must agree in writing that the
supply of water to the premises may be restricted by
a flow restrictor. The verification form of information
supplied by applicants must be completed by an
authorised official and the relevant ward councillor
must be involved during the evaluation process and
must verify the application together with the relevant
officials. Applicants are required to sign and submit
a sworn affidavit, to the effect that all information
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38
supplied is true and that all income from formal and/
or informal sources, is declared. Any person who
supplies false information will be disqualified from
further participation in the subsidy scheme. They
will also be liable for the immediate repayment of
all subsidies received and the institution of criminal
proceedings, as the municipality deems fit.
Lepelle-Nkumpi demands a social worker’s report
and an affidavit at a police station and Albert Luthuli
Municipality may send inspectors to visit indigent
households to record any changes in conditions and
can decide to discontinue indigent subsidy. In Nelson
Mandela Bay, the applicant must notify the Council
immediately if their financial position changes,
because the municipality may visit the applicant to
verify the information on the application when it is
deemed necessary. Furthermore, any result of fraud or
non-disclosure of facts will make the account holder
liable to immediate payment and prosecution. This
amounts to blatant stigmatisation and criminalisation
of the poor, and is in contradiction to the spirit in
which FBS are meant to be delivered to the poor. In
most municipalities, indigency status is temporary
(typically one or two years), and people have to go
through the full registration application process every
year or two years.
As mentioned in part 5.2.3, in many municipalities,
households have to agree to the installation of
flow restrictors or PPMs in order to qualify (these
mechanisms are examined in part 5.5.4 below).
There are other problematic conditionalities attached
to indigent registration. In Madibeng, following
the installation of PPMs, water will not be sold to
consumers unless their full arrears, a connection fee
and deposit have been paid, and a service delivery
agreement is entered into. Moses Kotane does make
an exception for registered indigents, whose arrears
are suspended and frozen (i.e. no interest is charged).
However, once the person is no longer classified as
indigent (this need not necessarily be as a consequence
of the person being less poor – it could simply be as
a result of the period of registration expiring and the
person not re-registering) then the full amount must
be paid and interest begins to accumulate again. In
some municipalities an ‘incentive’ is offered to register,
in the form of arrears write-offs. However, typically,
these arrears are not actually written off, but are rather
kept in abeyance. Where households tamper with
water restriction devices and/or default on their above
FBS bills, the arrears are reinstated with interest.
What emerges strongly from our research is that the
indigent policy is an ineffective pro-poor targeting
mechanism that detracts from more effective ways
of providing FBS to those who would greatly benefit
from them. Alternative, potentially more effective,
and humane methods of allocating FBS, including
universal or geographic targeting, should be explored.
5.3.4. Conclusion and
recommendations on indigent
policy as the FBS targeting
mechanism
The majority of municipalities in our survey provide
FBS only to those households that are registered for
their indigent policy. Using the indigent policy as the
means of allocating FBS to poor households is deeply
flawed from a social and developmental perspective.
It stigmatises the poor, reducing them to second
class citizens who do not fit into the contractual or
‘corporate’ mode of citizenship and service delivery.
Moreover, this kind of approach generally fails to
achieve the desired poverty-alleviation ends – in
other words it is ineffective at matching the ‘good’ –
water services – with the people who need it – the
poor. This for several related reasons. First, the most
vulnerable societal groupings (women, child-headed
households, and the unemployed), frequently are not
aware of the indigent policy or register and/or do not
register for fear of attracting adverse official attention.
Second, the process for qualifying differs vastly
across municipalities (suggesting no intrinsic value
or objective) but is typically very onerous, requiring
formal proof of poverty and regular re-application
to remain on the register. As a result, as highlighted
in our research, indigent registers are vastly under-
39
representative of the formally qualifying poor in each
municipality, indication itself, that this is not an
effective means of allocating such essential benefits.
There is much international evidence that targeted
approaches to poverty alleviation, especially those
that require registration for benefits, are inappropriate
and do not work. Universal approaches are far more
effective in that they neither stigmatise nor require
administratively onerous processes such as means-
testing/identification and monitoring.73
COHRE, SDC and UN-HABITAT’s Manual on
the Right to Water and Sanitation notes that it may be
useful to utilise a mixture of mechanisms to “evaluate
the economic capacity of users,” including: targeting
subsidies based on household income, form of access,
property value or geographical location. The manual
describes how a comparison of subsidy schemes in
Chile (based on household income) and in Colombia
(based on geographical location), suggests that it
may be beneficial to provide subsidies automatically
in low-income areas, but to permit people outside
such areas to apply for subsidies on the basis of their
low income.74 Targeted subsidies could then also be
provided to particular forms of access to water and
sanitation, such as small-scale facilities, conditional
upon a regulated (and widely advertised) price being
provided to the users of such facilities. Some of the
disadvantages identified in relation to income targeting
include:
Targeting schemes that are based on levels of
household income or expenditure are costly,
requiring administratively labour-intensive
surveys. Targeting is especially difficult where
73 See, for example, Standing, G., “Conditional Cash
Transfers: Why Targeting and Conditionalities Could
Fail”, International Poverty Centre, One Pager no. 47
(December 2007): http://www.undp-povertycentre.
org/pub/IPCOnePager47.pdf.
74 COHRE, SDC and UN-HABITAT, “Manual on the
Right to Water and Sanitation.” (2007), p. 135: http://
www.cohre.org/manualrtws.
there is a large informal economy (however, it is
possible to avoid this disadvantage by providing a
subsidy to a low-income area or to forms of access
that are more likely to be used by the poor, such
as kiosks, stand-pipes and public toilets);
Targeting is often imprecise. Even sophisticated
social security systems can exclude significant
numbers of the poorest residents, particularly
those living in rural areas, where it may be
difficult to keep people informed of their
entitlements;
In rental housing, landlords may capture the
benefit of a subsidy, rather than the intended
beneficiary. Transparent and clearly advertised
subsidies may help to prevent landlords from
including the benefit of the subsidy in rental
levels. However, where the supply of low-cost
accommodation is scarce, rent restrictions may be
required.75
One possible method of providing FBS to those in
need, which some municipalities are considering, is
that of geographic targeting. Geographic targeting
entails identifying poor areas for the allocation of FBS.
It requires municipalities to seek out those who do not
qualify, as opposed to placing the onus and burden on
those who do qualify to register with the municipality.
In South Africa, this method is quite attractive as
apartheid geography segregating racial groups is still
largely present, with poor (mainly black) areas clearly
delineated from rich (mainly white) areas. A greater
allocation of FBW could thus be automatically
allocated to known areas of poverty such as Soweto,
as well as certain buildings in the inner city. In order
to avoid rich people in Soweto from benefitting
unfairly, the City could focus its efforts at weeding out
undeserving recipients. This is a much more equitable
approach than having the default as no benefit, and
placing the onus squarely on poor households to
register. Moreover, although, inevitably, a fraction of
undeserving households will continue to benefit, this
75 Ibid., p. 136.
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40
situation is far preferable to a situation in which vast
numbers of deserving households do not benefit at all.
However, geographic targeting is less workable in
municipalities with overwhelmingly poor populations.
Moreover, the COHRE, SDC and UN-HABITAT
report mentions that subsidies based on geographical
location, while easier and cheaper to administer,
have the disadvantage of not always being able to
differentiate between the poor, who may be able to
pay a small amount, and the very poor, who cannot
afford to pay more than a nominal sum or anything
at all.76
The most ideal method of allocating FBS, and one
that makes more sense in overwhelmingly poor
municipalities, as well as generally, is that of universal
allocation. Regardless of type of municipality,
universal allocation is not only the most effective way
of ensuring that all deserving people receive the critical
benefit of FBS, but it has the additional benefit of not
requiring any administration to identify qualifying
households from non-qualifying households. Universal
allocation has a further benefit of countermanding
the otherwise negative stratification or segmentation
of water services, referring to the situation in which
rich and poor are offered different services, with the
rich invariably receiving better service, albeit at a price.
With universal allocation, FBS becomes something
that everyone – whether rich or poor – has an interest
in maintaining.
In South African municipalities, universal allocation
could be effected through an appropriate amount
of water calculated per person per day (starting at
50 litres per person per day but incorporating an
additional amount for sanitation where there is water-
borne sanitation) worked out across a suburb’s average
number of persons per household. In municipalities
with richer water users, universal targeting could be
afforded through steep tariffs at the luxury end of the
water services spectrum, ensuring that those who use
excessive amounts of water and can afford to pay, cross-
76 Ibid.
subsidise the poor.77 In uniformly poor municipalities
cross-subsidies would have to come from national
government.
5.4. Tariffs
As outlined in part 4.7 on tariff policy, local
authorities have the mandate to determine their own
tariff structures and pricing in line with national
principles and requirements for water services tariffs,
including the Norms and Standards. A major problem
experienced by poor people is the unaffordability of
services and the non-progressive tariff structures that
are implemented within municipalities.78 This fault
line covers the following issues:
the unaffordability of water services for the poor
and the absence of affordability and elasticity
of demand studies being done to ascertain fair,
equitable and effective revenue from tariffs;
inappropriate tariff structures; and, of specific
concern, the
sharp tariff increase following the FBW block.
Tariffs are an important source of revenue for
municipalities and the priority of cost-recovery drives
the development of tariff structures. In metropolitan
municipalities, income from water services (water
and sanitation) generally accounts for between 10
and 16 percent of total municipal income (capital and
O/M), for example, in Ekurhuleni it is 16 percent and
in eThekwini it is 11 percent. In rural municipalities
it is much less; in Albert Luthuli Municipality it is
4 percent and in Dr J.S. Moroka Municipality it is
about 2 percent.79 Cost-recovery imperatives have
inclined municipalities to focus on financial viability
(covering initial capital costs and O/M) at the expense
of its social and environmental duties towards citizens.
77 See part 5.4 below, for more information on progressive
tariff structures.
78 This fault line deals with problems around tariffs and
affordability for metered connections specifically.
79 These statistics are for the municipalities’ actual
budgets for 2005-2006 and are based on information
supplied by the National Treasury. See Gaffney’s
Local Government in South Africa 2007-2008 Official
Yearbook, at note 72, pp. 1572, 1575, 1591-1592.
41
Indeed, it is clear from many of the local officials
interviewed that people are viewed as consumers and
not citizens or users, and within this paradigm, water
is viewed as an economic good and source of revenue,
rather than a social good necessary for human life,
health and dignity. The recently published 2007-2008
International Water Report and Cost Survey has shown
that South Africans are paying 70 percent more for
water now than five years ago, with the country having
the third highest increase worldwide. Experts have
predicted that tariffs will rise even higher over the
next few years as a result of aging infrastructure, water
shortages from 2013, supplying new areas with water,
and the expected removal of the cross-subsidisation
of water prices with electricity revenue once regional
electricity distributors (REDs) are introduced.
According to the South African general manager of the
American company who undertook the survey, “with
the introduction of REDs, the cross-subsidisation of
water prices with electricity revenue will eventually
be removed, forcing councils to charge cost-reflective
prices for water.” This will inevitably mean higher
water bills for South Africans in the future.80
The national framework, in terms of which
municipalities are forced to grapple with all the
financial and technical responsibility of water services,
coupled with neoliberal cost-recovery imperatives,
has resulted in a mindset in which water services are
viewed as a fragmented function, isolated from health
care, education and other critical developmental and
rights-based aspects, thus compromising equitable
and effective service delivery within municipalities.
As McDonald writes, “there is a fundamental
contradiction here between the drive to ringfence a
service so it can better isolate its own micro costs and
the need to understand the broader macro-economic
costs and benefits of a particular service (e.g. public
80 Benjamin, C.,“Country Warned of Rocketing Water
Tariff Increases.” Business Day (2 October 2008):
http://allafrica.com/stories/200810020259.html.
Accessed 15 October 2008.
health).” Here, McDonald is referring to the outbreak
of a massive cholera epidemic in rural Kwazulu Natal in
2000, which was precipitated (or at least exacerbated)
by cost-recovery efforts introduced in the area.81 In this
regard it is worth noting that DWAF has emphasised
in its National Water Services Regulation Strategy,
the need for municipalities to financially ring-fence82
water services in order to promote greater efficiency.
Undoubtedly, ring-fencing of water services would
facilitate easier determination of the cost of water
services provision – something that is currently not
very effectively done. However, so far, only eight out
of 284 municipalities exhibit financially ring-fenced
water services.83
It remains to be seen how DWAF hopes to achieve
ring-fenced WSAs across all municipalities. More
importantly, before more municipalities embark on
ring-fencing more research is necessary to ascertain
the extent to which the assumed benefits –mainly
financial accountability and transparency - of this
proposed financial ring-fencing will outweigh the
potentially negative consequence to broader social
and developmental goals of the likely increased
fragmentation of critical functions at the municipal
level. The benefit versus harm of ring-fenced water
services may vary from municipality to municipality,
so locally-specific studies are essential.
81 McDonald, D., “The Theory and Practice of Cost
Recovery in South Africa”, at note 3, p. 30.
82 Ring-fencing typically means institutional separation
of water services functions and finance from other
municipal finance, typically through corporatising the
water services provider.
83 The City of Johannesburg, Nelson Mandela
Metropolitan Municipality, iLembe District
Municipality, UThukela District Municipality,
Vhembe District Municipality, Maluti-a-Phofung
Municipality, Mangaung Municipality and
Mogalakwena Municipality have financially ring-fenced
water services, while the City of Cape Town is partially
ring-fenced.
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In the meantime, according to current policy,
DWAF has clearly stipulated in section 6(2) of the
Norms and Standards that tariffs should be set as a
volume based charge that provides for a rising block
structure that includes three or more tariff blocks,
with the tariff increasing for higher consumption
blocks.84 Section 6(2)(c) of the Norms and Standards
states that the tariff structure must include a “first
tariff block or lowest tariff block with a maximum
consumption volume of six kilolitres and which is
set at the lowest amount, including a zero amount,
required to ensure the viability and sustainability of
water supply services”. Consumption between 0 and
6kl per household per month should be provided for
free if a FBW policy is being correctly implemented.
The second block in a three-block tariff structure is
for “normal consumption” meaning that the upper
consumption limit of this block should be set such
that a household that uses water sparingly should be
able to be accommodated within this block. The tariff
charged for consumption in this block should ideally
reflect the actual or average cost of water. The third
or highest block is for ‘luxury consumption’, and “a
household that uses water for luxury purposes, such
as for filling a swimming pool or a household that does
not use water sparingly should be required to pay a
higher than average price for water that reflects the
economic cost of this scarce resource”.85 It could also
be argued that the careless use of water is a major cause
of having to construct new infrastructure earlier than
what would have been required if water was conserved.
Section 6(2)(d) of the Norms and Standards states
that a tariff structure must include a “tariff for the last
block or highest consumption block set at an amount
that would discourage high water use and that reflects
the incremental cost that would be incurred to increase
the capacity of the water supply infrastructure to meet
an incremental growth in demand”.
84 Section 6(2)(a) of the Norms and Standards.
85 DWAF, “Guidelines for Compulsory National
Standards and Norms and Standards for Water
Services Tariffs” (August 2002), p. 56: http://
www.dwaf.gov.za/Documents/FBW/regulations/
FBWRegulationsAug2002.pdf.
There are several ways in which municipalities can
structure their pricing for water users, and this
obviously depends on whether water connections
are metered or non-metered. Flat rates for metered
connections are clearly not acceptable, because they
are not a progressive pricing strategy. Often, however,
tariff structures provide the compulsory 6kl of FBW
followed by a steep, concave curve, which makes
the next consumption block unaffordable to many
households, commonly leading to water disconnections
for non-payment of bills and people turning elsewhere
to gain access to water.86 Rising block and exponential
rising tariff structures, which take into account how
much water is consumed in how much is charged,
can obviously only be implemented when there is a
metered connection. For non-metered connections
the norm is for there to be a flat rate charged (also
known as ‘deemed consumption’), generally different
for indigent and non-indigent (generally referred to as
‘residential’) households. Our research reveals that flat
rates for non-metered water connections are charged in
Dr J.S. Moroka, Lepelle-Nkumpi, Ekurhuleni, Nelson
Mandela Bay and Amathole District Municipality,
as well as for sanitation in Albert Luthuli, Dr J.S.
Moroka, Blouberg and Msunduzi (see Appendices).87
Regarding sanitation provision, Appendix 7.3 provides
a rather crude comparison of sanitation charges across
the municipalities. What can be gleaned from this is
that municipalities, in contrast to the more uniform
consumption-based block tariff approach to water
provision, approach sanitation in rather an ad hoc
manner. Pricing strategies for sanitation provision
differ considerably, with municipalities using a flat rate,
a tariff structure based on plot size, a consumption-
based tariff or a hydraulic-based system.
86 Bond, P. and Dugard, J., “Water, Human Rights and
Social Conflict: South African Experiences.” Law,
Social Justice & Global Development Journal, 1 (2008),
p. 9: http://www.go.warwick.ac.uk/elj/lgd/2008_1/
bond_dugard.
87 While we have attempted to locate and verify the most
recent water services charges for each municipality,
we acknowledge that some prices have subsequently
changed, or have been based on incorrect information
supplied to us.
43
From a pro-poor and environmental perspective,
a worst case scenario would be where everyone is
charged a flat rate for water, regardless of what level
of service they are at, how much water they actually
consume or how much they can or cannot afford to
pay i.e. whether they are registered as indigent or not.
This is clearly not in line with what is stipulated in
the National Water Act, the Water Services Act, as
well as the Strategic Framework for Water Services. A
best case scenario would be a tariff structure that takes
into account not only whether a water connection
is metered or not and how much water is actually
consumed, but is also stepped in such a way as to
ensure affordability for the poor for water consumed
over and above the FBW amount, as well as punishing
rich, high-end consumers of excessive water amounts
i.e. ‘hedonistic consumption.’ In essence, what is ideal
is a progressive, rising block tariff structure that is
pro-poor and takes into account large household sizes
of those in poorer socio-economic brackets, but also
promotes water conservation and cross-subsidisation
at the higher end, penalising those at the luxury end of
the water consumption spectrum.
There are various ways that municipalities can structure
their pricing for rising block tariffs structures. Plotting
the block tariffs on a graph, with consumption units on
the horizontal x-axis and price on the vertical y-axis,
the shape of the graph, whether convex or concave,
indicates the relative price increases at various levels
of water consumption. A concave graph (see figure 3
below) sees water tariff prices rise steeply per unit of
consumption at relatively low levels of consumption,
with lower relative increases for higher levels of
consumption. In contrast, a convex graph (see figure
2 below) has relatively gradual price increases per unit
of consumption at lower consumption levels, with
tariff increases becoming steeper and steeper at higher
consumption levels.
FIG. 2. CONVEX GRAPH FIG. 3. CONCAVE GRAPH
FIG. 4. GRAPH THAT IS CONVEX AT LOW
PRICES/CONSUMPTION AND CONCAVE AT
HIGH PRICES/CONSUMPTION
Price
R
Price
R
Consumption
kl
Consumption
kl
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Hypothetically, it is possible to develop a different
tariff structure for poor suburbs and areas, raising
the amount of free water to perhaps 12kl per month,
which would result in a greater degree of convexity
in the shape of the tariff structure up until the point
where consumers begin to pay for water (the point of
inflection), after which time the graph would become
concave (see figure 4 above). The point of inflection,
or point at which consumers begin to pay for water,
could be changed in order to satisfy any number of
criteria including cost-recovery, equity and water
conservation. It is probable that in very large poor
households 12kl may not be enough to provide for
50 litres per person per day; however the amount of
FBW provided, and hence the location of the point
of inflection on the graph of the water tariff, could
be changed to meet the needs of specifically poor
areas. The municipality could still apply its original
tariff to richer suburbs, or even raise the tariffs for
these areas in order to recoup the increased revenue
losses it would experience in poorer areas. There are
numerous precedents for applying differential tariff
structures to different socio-economic areas within a
municipality.88
While it is clear that tariffs for metered connections
should be applied in proportion to water use and
should take into account affordability for the poor,
the reality is that in most rural municipalities and
informal settlements with many indigent households,
the level of service is basic, comprising a communal
tap charged at flat rate or provided free with a flow
restrictor attached. The problem in these cases may
not necessarily be with households’ inability to pay
i.e. affordability, but rather with the inability to access
the progressive realisation of a higher level of service
because of financial and other constraints faced by
municipalities (as outlined in part 5.1). It is to be
88 This paragraph and the description of the concave
and convex tariff structures above are taken from a
supporting affidavit by economist Paul Berkowitz
in the Mazibuko case, which dealt with pro-poor
tariff structures and pricing strategies for the City
of Johannesburg: http://web.wits.ac.za/Academic/
Centres/CALS/BasicServices/PhiriWaterRights.
htm.
expected that discrepancies in tariff structures across
the municipalities would exist, due to varying resource
bases, differences in the types of settlements, the levels
of service provided and the scarcity of water within
the municipality. However, what is problematic
is the apparent disregard for affordability criteria
when setting water and sanitation tariffs. There is
no DWAF national regulatory website (as is the case
with water quality) and no DWAF consultants (that
we are aware) working with municipalities on issues
around tariff structuring and affordability.
5.4.1. (Un)affordability of water
services for the poor
The push towards full cost-recovery within
municipalities is evident, especially in the poorer
and less-capacitated municipalities, and the need to
increase internal revenue was strongly articulated in the
interviews, despite the fact that many poor households
simply cannot afford to pay for water and sanitation
services. While we did not attempt any affordability
studies, in the course of our research a concern over
affordability for poor water users in tariff setting
policies was only expressed by two municipalities,
namely eThekwini and Witzenberg. We get the sense
that most municipalities do not have the capacity to
undertake the kinds of affordability studies that would
be necessary for appropriate tariff policy setting.
Only two municipalities in our research attempted
to answer the question about what percentage of
household income is spent on water and sanitation
within their jurisdiction. Amathole District
Municipality stated that people are generally prepared
to spend between 1 percent and 5 percent of their
disposable income on payment for services; however
the level of service and context play a major role.
According to Amathole, people may be unwilling to
pay for what is perceived to be a low level of service,
however they may be prepared to pay up to 10 percent
of their disposable income where access to alternative
sources of water are not available. The district
municipality stated that the bulk of its population is
unable to afford even the basic level of service without
some form of subsidy; therefore it relies very heavily
45
on its ES allocation. Witzenberg stated that their
WSDP does make consideration for the affordability
of tariffs and stated that that the municipal bill for all
services should not exceed 10 percent of the monthly
income for poor households. These affordability
calculations are based on the middle income group
(R1,600 – R3,200 income per month), as services for
lower income groups are subsidised. The recently
published COHRE and UN-HABITAT Manual on
the Right to Water and Sanitation provides an interesting
case study on Chile regarding the unintended effect of
indigent targeting.89
89 COHRE, SDC and UN-HABITAT, “Manual on the
Right to Water and Sanitation”, at note 74, p. 139.
AFFORDABILITY OF WATER SERVICES
Chile’s subsidy system for water, based on the
assessed income of the household, has been seen as
a model for targeted subsidies towards low income
groups. As a crude approximation of ability to pay,
the Chilean policy aims to ensure that no household
pays more than five percent of its monthly income
in water and sewerage charges. Using household
survey information for each region and published
tariffs, the ministry responsible determines how
many households need a subsidy, and how large
benefits need to be to meet the benchmark for each
region. This approach can only be successful where
all households have a connection to water and
sanitation services, which is the case in Chile.
5.4.2. Inappropriate tariff structures
Most of the municipalities we interviewed stated
that they utilise cross-subsidisation in their tariff
structure, in that higher end users subsidise lower end
users. Yet, there are concerning trends. For example,
Albert Luthuli Municipality has the same per kl block
tariff structure for residential households as it does
for business, industry and government departments.
This tariff policy runs counter to the cost-recovery
philosophy of “the more you use the more you pay,” and
unfairly discriminates against residential consumers.
This practice also violates the Norms and Standards
on the separation of different types of consumers (see
part 4.7 above), which clearly states that when setting
tariffs for water services a water services institution
must differentiate between a) water supplied for
household use i.e. domestic consumption; b) water
supplied for industrial use i.e. to a factory and c) water
supplied for other use i.e. commercial (e.g. offices) or
institutional use (e.g. schools or hospitals). The same
differentiation applies for setting tariffs for sanitation
services.90
The logic often used to defend a position of little
differentiation between water users is that charging
higher tariffs for consumption for commercial and
industrial purposes will increase costs and force them
out to areas with cheaper costs. In Ekurhuleni, tariffs
are set to promote the development of “competitive
business” and the commercial tariff structure is therefore
not loaded with heavy cross-subsidy requirements. In
the absence of enforceable national guidelines and
regulation regarding relative pricing between domestic
and commercial/industrial/agricultural/institutional
users, local government is left to create its own policies
and tariffs, which might contradict national priorities,
strategies and developmental goals.
5.4.3. Sharp tariff increase following
the FBW block
Municipalities state that higher tariffs charged for
increased water consumption are used as a deterrent
to inefficient water use and as a water conservation
mechanism. However it is evident from the research
that for poor or indigent households there is sometimes
a high penalty applied for those who consume more
than the free basic amount. For instance, there are
some municipalities including Msunduzi, Dr J.S.
90 Section 4(1) of the Norms and Standards.
Fault Lines
FIVE
Water Services Fault Lines
46
Moroka and Ekurhuleni, where indigent consumers
are clearly penalised within the tariff structure for
using more than the free basic amount, normally set at
6kl per household per month. An extreme and rather
shocking example of this was found in Msunduzi
Municipality where automatic indigents receive the
first 6kl free and pay R9.04/kl thereafter, a substantially
higher tariff charge that normal residential users
pay (see figure 5).91 In Dr J.S. Moroka Municipality
indigents receive the first 6kl free however 7 - 10kl is
R1.60/kl which is more expensive than the R1.40/
91 In Msunduzi Municipality there are three classifications
of indigents: automatic indigents (house and land
valued under R30,000), applied indigents (house
and land valued between R30,000 and R40,000)
and applied indigents (house and land valued over
R40,001). There is no application process for automatic
indigents and no conditions attached to their status,
however it is important to note that most new RDP
housing developments install water restricting devices
automatically. Applied indigents in the municipality
receive the first 6kl free and pay R3.49/kl from 7–12kl,
and R9.04/kl for consumption thereafter.
kl that normal consumers pay up to 10kl. Anything
consumed above 10kl is charged at normal residential
rates. This penalises extra consumption of water
beyond the free basic amount only for indigents and
not for other consumers. In Ekurhuleni, if registered
indigents use more than the 9kl/month then they are
charged as per the normal domestic tariffs. According
to the municipality, this was done in order to encourage
indigent households to conserve water as well as not
to consume above 9kl, in line with the income of the
household.
FIG. 5. BLOCK TARIFF STRUCTURE ACROSS MUNICIPALITIES
18
16
14
12
10
8
6
4
2
0
price (rands) per kilolitre
0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 90 100
kilolitres consumed
Moses Kotane
Madibeng
Albert Luthuli
Dr J.S. Moroka
Dr J.S. Moroka - indigent
Ekurhuleni
Nelson Mandela
Stellenbosch
Witzenberg
Cape Town 1
Cape Town 2 - domestic clusters
Ethekwini 1 - full pressure
Ethekwini 2 - semi pressure
Msunduzi
Blouberg
47
Plotting the tariffs for metered households reveals
the variation in tariff structures across municipalities.
Figure 5 shows the convexity/concavity of the tariff
structures for 13 municipalities. Sharp rises in the
second block are evident across several municipalities
– Msunduzi, Cape Town, Albert Luthuli, and
Ekurhuleni. With the exception of Moses Kotane,
Cape Town and Ekurhuleni, the rates seem to taper
off after about 50kl, suggesting rather concave tariffs
instead of the more appropriate convex ones (where
high consumption is charged heavily). Dr J.S. Moroka
and Blouberg have nearly flat tariffs and Witzenberg’s
per-kl rates fall between the second and third block.
Similarly, Madibeng lowers the rates for consumption
above 100kl from R7.06/kl to R4.77/kl (not shown in
figure). When interpreting the figure, it is important to
note that many indigent connections are not metered,
receive a flat rate and are therefore excluded from the
figure above.
Appendix 7.2 lists each municipality and gives
information on a) the number of blocks in the water
tariff structure, b) the amount per kilolitre charged in
the second block (the block above the free basic block
for indigents), c) the price per month for indigents/
poor to consume 12kl,92 d) the price per month for
normal residential users to consume 12kl, e) the
percentage that indigents pay for 12kl/month of what
normal residential users pay for the same amount
and finally f) the amount of FBW provided by the
municipality. A number of interesting observations
can be made from comparing these different indicators.
In all municipalities, apart from Cape Town and
eThekwini, the largest rise in the tariff structure is in
the block following the free basic amount. Therefore,
those most affected or penalised are not actually the
high-end water users, but those who for whatever
92 This is based on Dr Gleick’s analysis of the minimum
amount of basic water required to sustain a healthy and
dignified life, as per an (average) household of eight
people (see note 33).
reason are not registered, as indigent but who are still
poor.
The municipality with the most blocks in its tariff
structure is Madibeng with 10 blocks in total, while
Moses Kotane, eThekwini and Msunduzi all have only
three blocks in their tariff structures. Msunduzi has
the highest second block of the tariff structures with
a charge of R9.04/kl for automatic indigents. This
charge is more than the R7.06/kl block charged for
water consumed between 42.1 and 100kl in Madibeng.
Dr J.S. Moroka has the lowest second block charge
at R1.60/kl. The graph in figure 6 below plots across
the 15 municipalities (including local municipalities
within Amathole District Municipality), the charge
for indigents (per kilolitre) for the second block of the
tariff structure.
In terms of the cheapest and most expensive
municipalities for indigents to consume 12kl per
month, the City of Cape Town provides in effect 13kl
free to indigents, while in comparison it costs R54.24
per month for automatic indigents to consume the
same amount in Msunduzi. For ‘normal’ residential
users, it costs R113.43/month to consume 12kl with
a full pressure connection in eThekwini, while in
Cape Town it costs only R18.30/month. The graph
in figure 7 below plots the price of 12kl for indigents
across the municipalities.
Another interesting comparison is the percentage
change between how much it costs indigents to use
12kl/month and how much non-indigent residential
users pay for the same amount. This has been discussed
previously in the fault lines that deal with FBS, and
indigent policy as the FBS targeting mechanism,
respectively. The graph in figure 8 represents the
cross-subsidisation for 12kl within the municipalities,
with the y axis indicating the ratios of the indigent to
general charge for 12 kl of within the municipalities.
What the above graphs show is that there is a wide
variance in how tariff structures are constructed,
and, how much is charged within municipalities for
Fault Lines
FIVE
Water Services Fault Lines
48
FIG. 6. CHARGE PER KL FOR THE SECOND BLOCK FOR INDIGENTS
10
9
8
7
6
5
4
3
2
1
0
Tariff (Rand)
Dr J.S. Moroka
Blouberg
Nxuba
Albert Luthuli
City of Cape Town
Great Kei
Stellenbosch
Msunduzi (appl)
Nkonkobe
Mnquma
Witzenberg
Madibeng
Mbhashe
Amahlathi
Nelson Mandela Bay
Ngqushwa
eThekwini(semi)
Ekurhuleni
Moses Kotane
eThekwini (full)
Msunduzi (auto)
Municipality
FIG. 7. PRICE TO CONSUME 12 KL FOR INDIGENTS
60
50
40
30
20
10
0
Charge for indigents for 12
kl (Rand)
City of Cape Town
Dr J.S. Moroka - metered
Dr J.S. Moroka - non-metered
Blouberg
Nelson Mandela Bay - metered
Albert Luthuli
Nxuba
Ekurhuleni
Great Kei
Stellenbosch
Witzenberg - controlled
Mnquma
Nkonkobe
Witzenberg - uncontrolled
Madibeng
Amahlathi
Mbhashe
Ngqushwa
eThekwini (semi)
Moses Kotane
eThekwini (full)
Msunduzi (appl)
Msunduzi (auto)
49
FIG. 8. CROSS-SUBSIDISATION FOR 12 KL
120.00%
100.00%
80.00%
60.00%
40.00%
20.00%
0.00%
Ratio of indigent/general charge for 12kl
City of Cape Town
Witzenberg - uncontrolled
Nelson Mandela Bay - metered
Dr J.S. Moroka - metered
eThekwini (full)
Msunduzi(appl)
Witzenberg - controlled
Ekurhuleni
Msunduzi (auto)
Blouberg
Great Kei
Amahlathi
Mnquma
Ngqushwa
Nxuba
Nkonkobe
Mbahashe
Stellenboshch
Dr J.S. Moroka-non-metered
Albert Luthuli
Madibeng
eThekwini (semi)
Moses Kotane
Fault Lines
FIVE
the same amount of water consumed. What is also
clear though from these graphs is that they fall on
the classic bell curve, whereby most municipalities
lie within an average and a few municipalities at the
extremes (although the municipalities differ slightly
for each extreme). The graphs show, in a broad-brush
way (without looking at other factors like resources,
capacity etc) that more ambitious pro-poor tariffs
and charges are possible, while the tariffs of some
municipalities are highly problematic.
5.4.4. Conclusion and
recommendations on tariffs
The setting of tariffs should be an exercise in striking an
appropriate balance between providing affordable water
and sanitation services, and ensuring the sustainability
(in economic and environmental terms) of rendering
such services. Every municipality’s tariff structures
should be based on and reflect this logic. However, such
logic was not evident to us and the glaring disparity
across the current tariff landscape is cause for concern,
suggesting a role for greater national standardisation,
albeit ensuring local appropriateness. The first step
would be for DWAF to assist municipalities to
determine (a) the actual costs of providing water
and sanitation services, (b) how much revenue they
are receiving from these services, (c) how much poor
households can afford to spend on water and sanitation
services and (d) how many richer users exist and how
much they can afford to pay to cross-subsidise poorer
users (this involves studies of elasticity of demand of
rich water users i.e. at what charge will high-end users
start to decrease their water consumption). Such data
is needed to develop and implement progressive and
affordable tariff structures. Another recommendation
is for DWAF to monitor water and sanitation tariffs
in a similar manner to which it monitors water quality,
with an obvious emphasis on accuracy, efficiency,
enforcement and equity.
Water Services Fault Lines
50
5.5. Credit Control Enforcement
- Water Disconnections and
Restriction Devices
Across the municipalities we surveyed, cost-recovery
and financial sustainability pressures dominate
local officials’ attitudes and actions towards service
delivery, especially in poorer and under-capacitated
municipalities. Yet, while all municipalities are
focused on credit control,96 our research identified
different approaches to, and methods of, credit control
enforcement. One municipality in our study, Lepelle-
Nkumpi, stands out for not engaging in credit control
enforcement at all – instead municipal officials go
door to door instructing users to pay their accounts,
and they report a high level of compliance among
households that can pay for services. This sensitive
approach to non-payment in poor areas might not be
replicable in larger municipalities, but our research
suggests that alternative methodologies need to be
explored.
Across the other municipalities that utilise credit
control enforcement, the following issues were
identified in the course of the research:
problems related to the institutional separation
of credit control enforcement from meter reading
and service delivery within municipalities;
arbitrary and unfair approaches to water services
credit control enforcement;
water disconnection as a method of credit control
enforcement; and
water restriction devices as a method of credit
control enforcement - PPMs and flow restrictors.
96 This fault line does not deal with debt recovery per se,
but rather deals with municipalities’ focus on curtailing
water revenue losses incurred by poor households
through the imposition of water limitation/restriction
devices and/or total disconnection of water supplies.
This is the sense in which we use the term credit control
in this report.
Another important investigation would be to inquire
into the scope and nature of the price elasticity of
demand for water services within municipalities. In-
depth studies have been conducted in Hermanus
around the use of progressive block tariffs in water
conservation and water demand,93 and on the Cape
Flats in the Western Cape, around water demand and
water pricing for the urban poor.94 However, accurate
data and recent in-depth studies of this nature are
scarce. It is vital for municipalities to understand the
shape of the demand curve in order to apply equitable
tariffs. The standardisation of tariffs, in particular
establishing parameters for the different block tariffs,
is also an area that needs to be explored further.95
93 Greater Hermanus Municipality was one of the pilot
sites for an integrated water conservation programme
using block tariffs in 1996, called the Greater Hermanus
Water Conservation Programme (GHWCP).
However, according to Pape, progressive block tariffs
in Hermanus were not an unqualified success, and
although water consumption was reduced by a third
while increasing revenue, the municipality is not typical
with its massive influx of tourists in season, and the
policy focussed on the former white suburbs while strict
credit control measures were simultaneously being
applied in the townships leading to water cut-offs. See
Pape, J., “Looking for Alternatives to Cost Recovery”
at note 3, p. 186. For an analysis of this programme
see Deedat, H., Pape, J. and Qotole, M., “Block Tariffs
or Blocked Access? The Greater Hermanus Water
Conservation Programme.” Occasional Papers Series
# 5 (October 2001): http://www.queensu.ca/msp/
pages/Project_Publications/Series/5.htm.
94 Jansen, A. and Schulz, C.E., “Water demand and
the urban poor: A study on the conditions for water
consumption on the Cape Flats.” Draft Paper, ESSA
Conference (September 2005): http://www.essa.org.
za/download/2005Conference/Jansen.pdf.
95 For example, Moses Kotane Municipality’s second
block covers consumption from 6.1- 45kl, while
Madibeng has 7 blocks till 45kl which offers a much
more nuanced and pro-poor approach.
51
Fault Lines
FIVE
5.5.1. Institutional separation of credit
control enforcement from other
functions
A recurring theme in our interviews was the division
within the municipalities of the responsibilities for
billing, metering, credit control and arrears payment,
and the enforcement of credit control. Generally
it is the Department of Finance or the Treasury
within the municipality that deals with the revenue,
billing and credit control aspects of water services,
while the Department of Technical Infrastructure,
Technical Services or Water and Sanitation actually
carry out credit control enforcement (through water
disconnections or the implementation of restricting
devices on defaulting households). This departmental
and inter-departmental fragmentation increases the
difficulty of comprehensively and equitably dealing with
problems when they arise. For example, if a silo-like
Department of Finance views a particular household’s
arrears in isolation from other information (e.g. the
household’s socio-economic status and ability to pay),
this increases the potential for undesirable outcomes
e.g. low-income/vulnerable households having their
water supply disconnected. In our survey, Witzenberg
recognised this problem, mentioning the need for a
more integrated approach between the technical and
financial departments, as well as for better planning, as
the population size within the municipality increases.
Similarly, there is often a further separation (both
ideologically and institutionally) of credit control
enforcement functions from meter-reading, which
is often outsourced, and billing, which is often
inaccurate. Because of the cost-recovery-related
pressures on WSAs and WSPs, many municipalities
focus more aggressively on payment at the expense
of ensuring the accuracy of bills and meter-reading.
In Msunduzi, the Department of Finance controls
billing however there is a move to outsource the meter
reading function. Msunduzi mentioned that one of the
problems with the Department of Finance controlling
the billing system is that they do not understand the
meters like the water and sanitation department,
and human error in reading meters is common.
Interestingly, the municipality stated that not all
houses or stands are metered and there are efforts to
install meters everywhere, not in order to move people
to higher levels of service or to promote progressive
and equitable access to water services, but to “increase
billing and revenue.” This assertion clearly highlights
the municipality’s preoccupation with cost-recovery.
Another major problem appears to be the collection of
bills in rural areas and the Department of Finance in
Albert Luthuli Municipality stated that the scattered
settlements made it difficult to implement a billing
system with accurate meters and meter reading.
Officials from Lepelle-Nkumpi stated that they have
been collecting revenue by default (Capricorn District
Municipality is supposed the collect revenue) primarily
in order to fund O/M, and that they stated that they
have had problems with human error in meter reading
in the past. According to them, the technical services
team was sent to Middleburg to study the electronic
cost-recovery system there, but the study was cut
short because of internal problems and now the
Department of Finance has taken over and has shown
a lack of interest in implementing electronic meter
reading. The tension between the two departments
within the municipality was palpable, as is the case in
other municipalities that were interviewed.
Adding to this non-integration and non-integrity
of information, in many municipalities, including
Ekurhuleni, eThekwini and Madibeng, the meter-
reading function is outsourced. eThekwini stated
that it has outsourced its meter-reading, providing
the business to ten small companies, and has recently
introduced a system of hand-held meter readers
which not only contain a GPS device to locate the
meter, but also a camera to capture the amount in
the eventuality of future disputes. In Madibeng, the
Department of Finance outsources meter reading to
private companies, however this is problematic because
meter reading plays a vital role in its internal revenue
Water Services Fault Lines
52
A tale of six buildings
collection, and there is no monitoring system in place.
This reactionary approach towards an important
source of revenue threatens infrastructure and service
provision, and is contradictory to cost-recovery
strategies. Ekurhuleni not only outsources its meter
readings, but also hires consultants to monitor the
outsourced meter readers. Recognising the problems
associated with the separation of meter reading from
other water services functions, Ekurhuleni explained
that, currently, its finance department controls
revenue and billing. However this scenario is likely to
change under a future institutional review as the water
services department wants to establish a revenue unit
within the Water Services Unit, which would perform
and control meter reading, billing and credit control
to ensure maximum integration of information and
functions.
5.5.2. Arbitrary and unfair credit
control enforcement
There is no doubt that municipalities face genuine
challenges in minimising financial losses incurred
by unpaid for water services. Although we did not
directly ask a question about uniformity of credit
control enforcement, it became clear in the course of
our research that some municipalities pursue arbitrary
and unfair approaches to water services credit control
– failing to target all debtors equally. In particular, we
found that the selective non-enforcement of credit
control measures against government institutions –
which, in many municipalities, are amongst the worst
debtors – is quite common.
A recent report revealed that eThekwini Municipality
is owed more than R400 million by government
departments for municipal services, the major portion
of a national government debt of almost R1 billion. The
City of Cape Town is owed R234 million, Ekurhuleni
is owed R163 million and Nelson Mandela Bay is
owed R21.5 million by government departments.
More research is necessary to determine the extent
of such selective non-enforcement of credit control,
but we predict that it is probably quite widespread.
Indeed there has been public criticism of the failure
of government departments to pay for municipal
services, which undermines the quality of service
delivery to the public and the ability of municipalities
to maintain infrastructure and conduct O/M.97 We are
certainly not advocating that government departments
necessarily be disconnected or have their water
restricted (although this does and should occur when
necessary). It is worrying that such a large percentage
of internal revenue for municipalities is simply not
being collected from those who arguably can afford
to pay, while at the same time poor households are
been disconnected and/or restricted because they are
consuming more than a basic minimum amount.
Another arbitrary and/or unfair credit control
practice that we encountered is the consolidation of
all municipal debt owed by a household. This occurs
in eThekwini, which consolidates all debts owing in
respect of electricity, water and rates into one account,
which is meant to give the Council more leverage
to pursue legal action against non-paying citizens.
This is a highly problematic system as, although it
ostensibly assists the municipality, it greatly affects
poor household’s ability to enjoy sustainable access
to adequate water services as their other debts
immediately form part of what they owe for water and
for which they are summarily punished.
5.5.3. Water disconnection
According to our research, an inevitable consequence
of the preoccupation with cost-recovery is the
disconnection of water supplies to people who cannot
afford to pay for water, regardless of their inability
to do so. The cost-recovery approach results in
municipalities (both rhetorically and through their
actions) turning citizens into customers and, in some
cases, into criminals. With a social and developmental
97 Wicks, J., “State still to pay Durban’s municipal
bills.” The Mercury (11 August 2008): http://www.
iol.co.za/index.php?set_id=1&click_id=124&art_
id=vn20080811054315913C817907. Accessed 15
October 2008.
53
Fault Lines
FIVE
settle the account. An acknowledgment of debt must be
completed to settle the arrears; however only account
holders with positive proof of ID or an authorised agent
with Power of Attorney will be allowed to complete
an acknowledgment of debt. Therefore, if you are not
an account holder (i.e. a backyard shack dweller), you
will be disconnected. More broadly, the municipality
might restrict or disconnect supply whenever the user
of the service fails to make payment, arrangement for
repayment, fails to comply with condition of supply
of the municipality, or causes a situation where in
the opinion of the municipality it is dangerous or a
contravention of relevant legislation. These conditions
are worrying because it gives the municipality broad
terms to justify disconnecting or restricting water
supply. When asked if there is any requirement to
ensure that people are not disconnected for their
inability to pay, most municipalities either answered
negatively, or said that their indigent policy covered
this.
restrictors and PPMs
While most municipalities stated that they do not
effect water disconnections, most exert credit control
through the imposition of water restriction devices
such as flow restrictors and PPMs. A flow restrictor,
or ‘trickle feeder’, is a brass disc with a tiny hole in
the centre which is placed in a pipe, dramatically
reducing the diameter of the pipe and restricting the
flow to a level that approximates the FBW amount.98
These notoriously unreliable flow restrictor devices
restrict the flow of water to unacceptable levels where
people have to wait for hours to fill a bucket, are not
guaranteed access to a sufficient amount of water, and
if there is an emergency i.e. a fire, do not have ready
98 Loftus, A., “’Free Water’ as Commodity: The Paradoxes
of Durban’s Water Service Transformation.” In
McDonald, D.A and Ruiters, G (eds.), The Age of
Commodity: Water Privatization in Southern Africa
(London, 2005), p. 194.
good such as water, strategies driven simply by cost-
recovery motives are problematic because they measure
success purely in financial terms and not in terms of
developmental benefit to the individual or group and
public benefit to society more generally. Often the
most frequent outcome of cost-recovery strategies is
to devolve the costs from the government to the user.
Eliminating water and sanitation backlogs is a
politically charged issue, and while municipalities
report on progress made in terms of eradicating water
and sanitation backlogs (as discussed in part 5.1),
they seldom mention how many households have had
their water entirely disconnected, or have had water
restriction devices imposed, due to non-payment of
bills. Only one municipality - eThekwini - provided
us with figures on disconnections. According to this
information, between October 2007 and March 2008,
eThekwini has issued 20,669 water disconnection
notices. Of these, 15,106 households have been
disconnected and the remaining households have had
water restricting devices installed, as opposed to being
outright disconnected.
The Water Services Act prohibits denying a person
access to a basic amount of water because of an
inability to pay, and this is why water restricting
devices (outlined in part 5.5.4 below) are used more
frequently than actual disconnections. Section 4(3)
(c) of the Water Services Act states that procedures
for the limitation or discontinuation of water services
“must not result in a person being denied access to
basic water services for non-payment, where that
person proves, to the satisfaction of the relevant
water services authority that he or she is unable to
pay for basic services.” When interviewed about
disconnections, almost every municipality told us that
they were not allowed to disconnect poor people’s
water supply. However, some municipalities admitted
to disconnecting illegal water connections.
In Moses Kotane Municipality, if a user does not pay
there will be a disconnection if no attempt is made to
Water Services Fault Lines
54
access to water. PPMs operate on a ‘pay-as-you-go’
principle, requiring people to purchase additional
(to the FBW allocation) water credit in advance, in
the form of vouchers. If there is no water credit the
PPM mechanism automatically disconnects the water
supply once the FBW amount is exhausted, providing
neither advance notification of the disconnection,
nor opportunity to make representation prior to the
disconnection, as required by section 4(3)(b) of the
Water Services Act.
FLOW RESTRICTORS
Moses Kotane, Madibeng, Dr J.S. Moroka, Blouberg,
Ekurhuleni, Nelson Mandela Bay, City of Cape Town,
eThekwini, Amathole, Msunduzi all stated that they
use trickle or flow restriction devices, with Moses
Kotane, Lepelle-Nkumpi, Msunduzi and Madibeng
all stating that registered indigents must accept a flow
restrictor device in order to qualify as indigent and
receive FBW.
In eThekwini, when a person falls into arrears the
notification is printed on the account, providing a
toll-free help line and information of offices where
the account can be paid. If there is no response from
the customer, the water supply is restricted to a flow
of 1 litre per minute. Flow restrictors are installed in
the water connections of all domestic customers who
have not paid for water for 60 days and who owe the
Council more than R110 for water used. If people
tamper with the flow restrictor, the connection is
completely removed and a standpipe is installed at the
closest municipal premises to allow for the provision of
FBW. According to the municipality, water restriction
is a punishment.
According to Dr J.S. Moroka Municipality’s 2007
WSDP, “the option of uncontrolled flow is considered
viable only where people can pay for services and
revenue collection will be imposed. It is not effective to
read meters and to do billing and debt collection from
indigents.”99 Therefore, the main advantage of flow
restrictors, according to the municipality, lies in the
99 Dr J.S. Moroka Local Municipality, “Water Services
Development Plan: Revision 1” (March 2007), chapter
2, p. 3.
ability to restrict the volume of water to 6kl, therefore
rendering the process “cheap and simple.” This logic is
highly problematic, particularly as there is little or no
attempt within municipalities to investigate whether
the 6kl default amount is sufficient to meet the needs
of the poor households within each municipality. Yet,
this approach appeared to us to be the norm when
speaking to municipal officials, especially those dealing
with largely poor jurisdictions and limited capacity.
The installation of flow restriction devices is being
considered in Stellenbosch municipality, who state
that it considers it inhumane to disconnect households;
however, flow restriction devices are arguably just
as perverse and inhumane and furthermore, highly
discriminatory.
In Albert Luthuli Municipality, the Department
of Finance implements its credit control policy and
notifies the Department of Technical Services where
to impose flow restrictors or trickle feeders. Here,
the restriction of water can be implemented when
the municipal account is only one day overdue. If the
debtor is in arrears for 30 days, the municipal manager
commences legal proceedings against the debtor, which
involves summons, court trials and as a last resort, the
sale and execution of property. Indigent households
are exempted from this action; however a cause for
concern is those households who are poor but not
registered as indigent and for whatever reason cannot
pay their bill on time. If they default on payment
(because they simply cannot afford payment) then the
municipality restricts their water supply, penalising
and criminalising them in the process.
Flow restrictors have not yet been legally challenged,
though they are vulnerable to a challenge based on
section 27(1)(b) of the Constitution in conjunction
with the Compulsory National Standards. Regulation
3(a)(i) of the Compulsory National Standards states
that the minimum standard for basic water supply
services is a minimum quantity of potable water of 25
litres per person per day or 6 kilolitres per household
per month at a minimum flow rate of not less than 10 litres
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per minute (own emphasis). It is highly unlikely that
the flow restrictors being imposed on poor households
comply with this regulation, and flow restrictors
imposed often only deliver water at a rate of 1 litre per
minute. This suggests that water restriction devices
are not only morally problematic, but could be legally
challenged. Any legal challenge that successfully
outlaws a water restriction device will have substantial
financial consequences for a municipality, a factor that
municipalities should take into consideration before
deciding to impose such devices on the poor.
PREPAYMENT METERS (PPMS)
The introduction of PPMs to poor households (often
in order for them to qualify for FBW in terms of
the municipal indigent policy, as outlined above) is
ostensibly to ‘protect’ the poor from the repercussions
of credit control policies. However, in reality the
installation of PPMs abdicates the responsibility for
municipalities to notify and deal with poor households’
payment issues and constitutes a punitive credit
control mechanism with neither adequate notification
nor opportunity to make representation prior to the
automatic disconnection of water.
Of the interviewed municipalities the following
use or are implementing PPMs: City of Cape
Town, Madibeng,100 Amathole, Moses Kotane and
Witzenberg. The City of Cape Town has indicated
that it intends to roll out more than 20 000 ‘water
meters’ within the next year. The director of water
and sanitation for the City of Cape Town has stated
however that its “water management devices” are not
100 Madibeng stated that they are piloting a PPM project
(about 400 households) in Sonop because they
believe that people in this area have access to good
infrastructure and reticulation and can afford to pay for
water, and that the municipality needs to collect this
revenue. Interestingly, Madibeng also mentioned that
in some areas people have been asking for PPMs to be
installed, however the municipality believes that this
is because people can bypass/override the system and
obtain water for free.
prepaid meters and that the devices (7 500 of which
have already been installed) cut water off each day
once the free daily limit is reached. This is meant to
conserve water and help poor residents budget their
water properly, however the fact is that they still
automatically disconnect after the exhaustion of the
pre-agreed amount. When this occurs, apparently
residents can then phone the municipality and apply
for more water over and above the 10kl FBW per
household per month. The South African Municipal
Workers’ Union (SAMWU) has announced it will use
the Mazibuko judgment as a basis for legal action in the
future against the City of Cape Town, to challenge the
automatic disconnection procedure in these meters.101
PPMs, as imposed on the residents of Phiri, Soweto by
the City of Johannesburg, were successfully challenged
in the recent Mazibuko case, with Johannesburg High
Court Judge, Moroa Tsoka, finding the installation
of PPMs to be unlawful and unconstitutional.102
The Mazibuko judgment is currently being appealed
by the City of Johannesburg, Johannesburg Water
(Pty) Ltd and DWAF, but, nevertheless, given the
unequivocal finding regarding the illegality of PPMs,
it is disturbing that other municipalities in South
Africa are continuing to install these devices in poor
households.
5.5.5. Conclusion and
recommendations on credit
control enforcement
Neoliberal cost-recovery approaches to water services
provision encourage strict credit control enforcement
for non-payment by the poor. Although more
research is needed to confirm this, there appears to
101 Foster, W., “Water wars move to Cape.” Mail and
Guardian (14 May 2008): http://www.mg.co.za/
articlePage.aspx?articleid= 339008&area=/insight/
monitor/. Accessed 15 October 2008.
102 Mazibuko judgment, at note 33, paras. 154-155 and
160.
Water Services Fault Lines
56
to obtain payment of its bill. In England and Wales,
water disconnection was prohibited by law in 1999
after wide use in the early 1990’s. In France, there is
agreement between water utilities companies and local
authorities that families with children and disabled
persons may not be disconnected. Poor people with
water in arrears have a moratorium for payment during
a few months and are entitled by law to seek financial
assistance from local social services. If they do not get
such assistance, then they are often cut off. PPMs with
automatic disconnection are very rare.104 When French
courts have to decide on a water disconnection case for
non-payment, they usually order the reinstatement of
supply in order to protect health and human dignity.
As court proceedings are slow and costly, NGOs
prefer putting pressure on mayors with a view to
reinstating water without delay or cost. Officials as
well as utility managers dislike publicity concerning
disconnections of poor households because they
know that the public would not support such drastic
measures. In many municipalities mayors have decided
neither to disconnect poor people, nor to allow water
utilities to do it; however will rarely admit it publicly
so as not to encourage non-payment of water bills. In
some municipalities such as Saint-Denis, the mayor
has taken a decree to forbid water disconnections of
poor households. In Paris, disconnection has to be
authorised by the Mayor.105
Finally, water restriction to poor households, too, should
be governed by a principled approach. If municipalities
can show that they prioritise debt recovery in rich
households, businesses and government buildings,
and where serial domestic defaulters have been
warned and had opportunity to make representations,
104 Smets, H., “Implementing the Right To Water in
France.” Paper presented at the Workshop on Legal
Aspects of Water Sector Reforms, International
Environmental Law Research Centre (Geneva, 20-21
April 2007), p. 7: http://academie.oieau.fr/IMG/pdf/
FranceGen-2.pdf.
105 Ibid., p. 8.
be a worrying trend to impose harsh credit control
measures on low-income residents, while higher-
income residents, businesses and government
departments are afforded far more leniency when they
do not pay their municipal accounts. Indeed, while
government institutions (and high-end domestic users
not canvassed in this research) get away with using
water on credit and not paying bills, poor water users
are disconnected or restricted to the free basic amount
through means of flow restrictors or PPMs. Such
methods of water restriction constitute an aggressive
and immediate form of credit control enforcement
and alienate citizens from their service providers.
Further research should be undertaken to investigate
the financial impact and extent of non-payment by
other types of users, such as industry, agriculture,
mining, high-end domestic users, as well as government
departments. In the meantime, and anyway, it might be
necessary to accept that there are poor residents who
will never be able to pay for water services (especially
those caught in debt traps), and to forgive their debt,
focussing rather on those consumers who default but
can afford to pay for water services. In this regard,
we recommend that municipalities and DWAF
investigate the true economic and social effects of
enforcing de facto disconnections in low-income areas
for non-payment of services, as it has been shown that
in OECD countries there is little economic impact on
water companies whether they enforce disconnections
or not.103
Water disconnection to poor households should be
governed by considerations of equity, to ensure
that people who are unable to pay for water do not
have their health and dignity compromised by a
municipality disconnecting their water supply. In a
number of countries, including Spain and Germany,
water disconnection is not permitted unless the
water company can prove that it has no other means
103 Smets, H., “Social Protection in Urban Water Sector
in OECD Countries.” Presented at the Consumer
Protection and Public Participation in the Reforms of
the Urban Water Supply and Sanitation in the EECCA
workshop (Paris, 4-5 March 2002), p. 19: http://www.
oecd.org/dataoecd/17/44/2391508.pdf.
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then humane water restriction devices might be
utilised, as long as deployed fairly across rich and poor
areas. This suggests a role for DWAF in regulating,
monitoring and enforcing guidelines and safeguards
across municipalities. In addition, ways must be
found to prevent water debt in the first place. This
includes subsidising water services, including O/M
costs, to poor households and communities, whether
through steeper tariffs for luxury consumption within
a municipality and/or greater transfers from national
government.
5.6. Financial and Technical
Assistance
The lack of financial and technical assistance available
for water services provision at the local level was
frequently identified by municipalities as a problem,
and there appears to be justification for local authorities
to question the nature and extent of the assistance
they receive from DWAF and national government
more generally. The apparent lack of political will
on the part of national government to assume overall
responsibility for the rollout of water services to the
poor, particularly through committing necessary
technical and financial resources to capacitate and fund
local authorities, remains a problem. Our research
indicates that the main sources of inter-governmental
financial assistance, the MIG and ES, are insufficient
to meet the water services-related needs of the poor,
and poor municipalities (without rich water users)
cannot cross-subsidise effectively. While this lack (or
perceived lack) of financial and technical assistance
does not always exonerate municipalities for poor
service delivery, it does appear to be a systemic problem.
In any event, whether the source of the problem is at
the local or national government level, we argue that
national government must take ultimate responsibility
in the interests of ensuring universal access, whether
through providing additional financial or technical
assistance. This fault line deals with:
problems with MIG funding;
problems with ES funding;
insufficient funding for the maintenance of
infrastructure; and
lack of skilled staff, leading to unfilled positions
and the appointment of under-qualified staff.
5.6.1. Problems with MIG funding
As discussed in part 4.4, the MIG is a consolidated
conditional grant from national government to
municipalities, designed to cover the capital costs
of infrastructure rollout to the poor. The MIG is a
temporary measure in place, officially until 2013, or
until municipalities are able to adequately raise internal
revenue to cover all water services-related costs. The
formula used to calculate the MIG takes into account
the number of water and sanitation backlogs in the
municipality, the water and sanitation allocation
amount and the total number of backlogs in South
Africa.106 The DPLG, DWAF, DPW and National
Treasury are each responsible for different aspects of
the allocation and monitoring of the MIG.107
A major problem with the MIG is that often
municipalities are not sufficiently capacitated to
plan innovatively and effectively around the MIG
process, and poor planning results in service delivery
targets not being met, MIG funding not being spent
efficiently or not being spent at all.108 Thus, often
municipalities that most need the funds are least
able to spend them. Furthermore, if a municipality
106 DPLG, Policy Framework, Appendix A, p. 2.
107 Ibid., pp. 11-18.
108 A recent article showed that Madibeng municipality,
despite being the fastest growing municipality in the
North West province, had only spent about 48 percent
of its entire MIG fund with less than two weeks to go
till the end of its latest budget cycle. See “North West
municipality under-spending.” IOL (23 April 2008):
http://www.iol.co.za/index.php?set_id=1&click_
id=124&art_id=nw20080423114551842C898391.
Accessed 15 October 2008.
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58
does not spend all the MIG funding in the year it
is allocated, the amount can be reduced. This aims
to promote financial transparency. However, in
under-capacitated municipalities, it has the adverse
consequence of reducing financial assistance when
greater assistance is needed to meet water services
needs. In capacitated (but poor) municipalities –
that are able to leverage maximum funding and
utilise it – the MIG is insufficient to meet needs. In
other words, the reality on the ground is that MIG
funding is insufficient for capacitated municipalities
and generally cannot be spent in under-capacitated
municipalities.109 The net outcome on the ground is
the same – poor communities without adequate access
to water services infrastructure. The plan to terminate
MIG funding in 2013 is a further concern, especially
for those municipalities that are unable to effectively
utilise internal tariff cross-subsidies.
5.6.2. Problems with ES funding
As described in part 4.5, the ES is an unconditional
grant (meaning that municipalities are not required
to report on how they allocate or spend their ES)
from national government to local government, which
serves as the main subsidy for O/M costs.
One criticism of the calculation of the ES that arose
in the interviews is the use of the “Revenue Raising
Capacity Correction” proxy figure in the formula
(set out in part 4.5), which is derived from reported
revenue raising capacity information reported to Stats
SA, along with objective municipal information from
Stats SA (usually based on Census 2001 figures). It
has emerged that the definition of “household” used
in the Census does not correlate predictably with
the units to which municipalities supply services.
Thus, census-defined households are not a good
proxy for consumer units, leaving no standard way of
establishing the number of consumer units serviced
and those requiring services. Rather, the critical figure
to base any calculation on is the absolute number of
poor households per municipality – this would ensure
109 This finding is echoed in The Water Dialogues,
“Preliminary Discussion Document”, at note 53.
more accurate and fairer ES allocations. To date there
has not been a move to address this data capturing and
analysis problem.110
Basing the ES allocation on inaccurate and outdated
figures has negative financial implications for many
municipalities. For example, Nelson Mandela Bay
stated that its operational budget is not sufficient or
sustainable as it is based on historical data, which do
not accurately reflect the contemporary reality. Officials
explained that this is because Nelson Mandela Bay’s
ES is calculated on the basis of basic service provision
in rural areas; however, the municipality is moving
towards a higher level of service delivery to poor
consumers in urban areas, which the ES calculation
does not currently reflect. A few municipalities
complained that their ES allocation was insufficient,
with the City of Cape Town stating that they could
not cover the real cost of financing FBS with their
ES allocation and had to use cross-subsidisation.
This is not necessarily a problem, as better-resourced
municipalities such as Cape Town, should be able
to effectively cross-subsidise using revenue from rich
water users. However, in poor municipalities this is
not possible, suggesting the need for much greater ES
allocation to poor municipalities.
Several municipalities mentioned, as problematic, the
fact that (largely because the ES is an unconditional
grant) ES allocation within municipalities is neither
regulated nor transparent. While the horizontal
division (between municipalities) of the vertical ES
(from national) is stipulated, as per the annually-
promulgated Division of Revenue Act (DORA), the
split of equitable share between different departments
within municipalities is not. Thus, the amount allocated
to water services provision in each municipality is left
110 Whelan, P., “The Local Government Equitable Share:
An explanation of its evolution and an evaluation of
current arrangements.” IDASA (February 2004):
http://www.idasa.org.za/gbOutputFiles.asp?
WriteContent=Y&RID=626.
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solely to the discretion of the municipality itself. The
effect of this in many municipalities is that water
services departments often end up receiving very little
of the ES funding. For example, Ekurhuleni water
services officials complained that the ES allocation
is primarily used up by the finance department
and little or no ES funding is ever seen by the
water and sanitation department. While some may
believe this is in the interest of local democracy and
municipal autonomy to allow maximum discretion to
municipalities, those involved in the provision of water
services have recommended that the ES amount should
be earmarked (and Gazetted as such), with specific
amounts allocated for water and sanitation services. It
would seem to us that a more conditional or regulated
approach to the ES would, in fact, promote local
government transparency and accountability, even if it
detracts somewhat from local government autonomy.
In our view, the trade-off is a necessary one.
infrastructure maintenance
Our overriding impression from the interviews is
that poor municipalities do not receive sufficient ES
to adequately cover their O/M needs. A common
consequence is inadequate spending on maintenance,
resulting in widespread problems (such as leaking and
burst water pipes and clogged sewerage) related to
faulty infrastructure.
Indeed, the majority of municipalities we interviewed
mentioned that they do not have enough funding for
maintenance. Dr J.S. Moroka Municipality was the
only municipality to state that it had sufficient funding
for maintenance, but that it had a problem spending
its grants and subsidies because of the lack of adequate
planning for both maintenance and operations. Albert
Luthuli Municipality explained that it has difficulties
in managing the financial burden of providing
water and sanitation services (to a largely poverty-
stricken population), as well as being responsible for
maintenance. Yet the municipality continues to try to
implement a cost-recovery process in order to obtain
much needed internal revenue in order to finance its
O/M.
Indeed, this situation seems to be a common one and
does not leave much choice for municipalities struggling
with financial and capacity constraints. Recently,
deteriorating infrastructure, drought and cable theft
left several communities in northern KwaZulu-Natal
with a serious water crisis, with the WSA blaming their
“shoe-string budget” which does simply not stretch far
enough. According to the WSA, its operating budget
is R50 million short of what is required to supply
the area’s two district municipalities.111 A persistent
problem is that ES allocation does not provide for
adequate O/M of infrastructure, and the MIG is
focused at capital expenditure.
5.6.4. Inadequate human capacity
Most of the municipalities interviewed expressed the
desire to increase their staff capacity, both in terms
of numbers and skills. They are concerned that their
failure to attract skilled graduates – especially engineers
and technicians, who are vital for the construction,
maintenance and repair of water services infrastructure,
as well as the treatment and testing of water quality –
seriously threatens current and future service delivery.
As recognised by Mike Muller, former director-
general of DWAF: “the ability of municipalities to
keep piped water clean and safe depends on having
appropriately qualified people in place to lead service
provision, and currently many municipalities are in a
state of crisis because they do not have enough of these
people on their staff. Organisational competence is a
major issue.”112
111 “Northern KZN faces serious water crisis.” SABC
News (13 September 2008): http://www.sabcnews.
com/south_africa/general/0,2172,176795,00.html.
Accessed 15 October 2008.
112 Mike Muller, quoted in “Developing crisis number
two.” The Weekender (17-18 May 2008), at note 7.
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60
According to a recent SALGA report, one in three
municipal councillors cannot read or write and more
lack basic competencies to run local government
finances. Also, more than two-thirds of councillors –
including those who serve on mayoral committees –
do not understand their roles, responsibilities or local
government legislation. These municipal councillors
have little understanding of local government issues
and the high illiteracy rate is greatly contributing to
poor service delivery.113 This is particularly worrying
in light of the fact that public participation in water
services provision is facilitated primarily through
ward councillors and ward committees, and it appears
that those tasked with linking communities and local
government are largely incapable of doing so effectively
or at all (see part 5.9 for more discussion of public
participation).
A recent statement by a DWAF spokesperson points
to the widespread shortage of skilled personnel at
municipal level being related to that fact that graduates
with the requisite skills are snapped up by the private
sector, which can afford to pay higher salaries.114 In
an attempt to counteract this trend, DWAF has
established bursaries to attract young people to study
specialised courses on water issues. However, there is
an official cap on wages for municipal workers, so it is
likely that the private sector will always be able to offer
higher salaries than local government.
During our interviews, some municipalities mentioned
that the cap on wages impairs their ability to attract
skilled full-time professionals and, as a result, if a
municipality wants to get a project completed properly,
it must hire expensive consultants. Although it is costly
to hire consultants, municipalities view this cost as
worthwhile because it potentially decreases the long-
term cost of having to repair the work of unqualified
113 Mbanjwa, X., “Municipality literacy shock.” IOL
(27 August 2008): http://www.iol.co.za/
index.php?set_id=1&click_id=13&art_
id=vn20080827060000370C991228. Accessed 15
October 2008.
114 DWAF spokesperson quoted in “Developing crisis
number two” The Weekender (17-18 May 2008), at
note 7.
and inexperienced municipal workers a few years
down the line. However, municipalities recognise that
outsourcing key municipal functions often impairs the
development of internal institutional knowledge.
Municipalities have to deal with financial as well
as technical challenges in meeting delivery targets
and carrying out O/M. Limited staff capacity leads
to the prioritisation of certain aspects of water
and sanitation delivery at the expense of others.
For example, Madibeng Municipality has access
to software technology to monitor infrastructure,
however the programme has not yet been used as there
is a chronic lack of skilled staff to use the software.
Interestingly, while Madibeng is relatively capacitated,
and is the fastest growing municipality in the North
West province, it has been under-spending its MIG
allocation, having only spent 48 percent of the fund
at the end of its recent budget cycle. The municipality
is also struggling to fill certain key management posts
which critically affect service delivery in the area.115
While it is clear that municipalities are experiencing a
crisis of lack of skilled personnel, there is a debate about
the extent to which service delivery problems can be
attributed to ‘lack of capacity’ or staff shortages. Some
have argued that a prioritisation problem, rather than a
capacity problem is the greatest hindrance to service
delivery. As Ben Fine points out, if South Africa is able
to find the skills and infrastructure to build World
Cup Stadiums and sophisticated transportation
facilities like the Gautrain, then surely it should be able
to build (at least) enough VIP toilets and community
standpipes within 200m for all its citizens.116 In reality,
there is probably a combination of lack of political will
at the national level and of capacity at the municipal
level, suggesting some role for DWAF as a national
115 “North West municipality under-spending.” IOL (23
April 2008), at note 108.
116 Fine, B., “The Minerals-Energy Complex is Dead:
Long Live the MEC?” Paper presented at the Amandla
Colloqium (Cape Town, 2008), p. 10.
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regulator, but also a role for political and civil society
in pressuring government to prioritise water services
through the allocation of sufficient financial resources
and the deployment, where necessary, of skilled
personnel to municipalities.
5.6.5. Conclusion and
and technical assistance
Our research findings suggest that current MIG and
ES funding is insufficient to ensure universal access
to adequate water and sanitation, particularly in
uniformly poor municipalities with limited potential
to secure revenue from internal tariff cross-subsidies.
A frequent casualty of this reality is the inadequate
maintenance of infrastructure, meaning that
municipalities face chronic problems of faulty piping
etc., which adversely affects their quality of service as
well as their long-term finances (while savings can be
made in the short-term by neglecting maintenance,
in the medium- and long-term such neglect leads
to higher costs). A further exacerbating factor is
municipalities’ inability to attract the requisite skilled
personnel to carry out key functions. It is clear that, if
water services are to be prioritised as they should be,
additional funding from national government must
be made available to ensure the necessary financial,
technical and human resources reach the municipal
level, where water services delivery occurs.
5.7. Water Quality
At the time of writing this report fears had been
expressed about a looming water quality crisis. Media
reports of baby deaths and cholera outbreaks in poor
and rural areas speak to the fact that a large proportion
of the population does not have adequate access to
sufficient clean and safe drinking water and sanitation
facilities, and that not enough is being done by local
municipalities, water services providers and DWAF
to address the crisis. This fault line deals with:
DWAF’s role in monitoring and enforcing water
quality standards;
inter-governmental and inter-departmental issues
around water quality;
problems with water quality monitoring at the
local level; and
the deteriorating quality of water in many South
African dams.
enforcing water quality standards
DWAF has played a relatively large role in water
quality monitoring and regulation, in comparison to
its regulation of any other aspect of water services
provision at a local level. There is, however, a consensus
amongst many organisations that a water quality crisis
looms.117 In response, DWAF has launched a new
certification scheme for water and sanitation services
across municipalities. Municipalities that comply with
95 percent of the criteria set for effective drinking water
management will receive a Blue Drop certification,
while municipalities that complied with 90 percent will
receive Green Drop certification. The stated aim of
the initiative is to build the confidence of citizens and
tourists and to incentivise municipalities through cash
benefits for compliance. According to DWAF, those
municipalities that do not comply, will receive Red
Drop status and will be named and shamed publicly.118
It would appear that this initiative will do little more
117 A submission made to the Parliamentary Portfolio
Committee on Water Affairs and Forestry’s public
hearings on water quality in June 2008, by the South
African Water Caucus, ECO-CARE Trust and the
CSO Regulations Reference group, highlighted some
of the issues and fears regarding water quality at present
(no electronic version currently).
118 Swanepoel, E., “DWAF unveils new water certification
scheme for municipalities.” Creamer Media’s
Engineering News (11 September 2008): http://
www.engineeringnews.co.za/article.php?a_id=142934.
Accessed 15 October 2008.
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62
than provide financial reward to those municipalities
that are already performing well, quell the fears of rich
water consumers, and embarrass those municipalities
that are not complying with water quality standards,
which could be for myriad structural reasons. Our
concern is that this process might not necessarily
address the structural reasons for municipal non-
compliance and under-performance (many of which
are outlined in this report), which would leave many
vulnerable local populations at risk. However, it is
hoped that, if the new certification scheme dovetails
with the process around developing DWAF’s role as
a national water services regulator, an effective system
of water quality enforcement might be forthcoming.
Obviously, the sooner this happens, the better.
Among the interviewed municipalities, DWAF’s
most prominent role in technical assistance to
municipalities was most consistently cited as being that
of monitoring water quality. DWAF uses a company
called Emanti Management located in Stellenbosch,
who administers the Water Quality Management
System (WQMS). Each WSA in South Africa is
required to submit monthly reports to the WQMS
website and consultants analyse and report back to
the WSA. Some of the difficulties with regulating on
reports to a national website include the accuracy of
the data reported on, as well as how municipalities
facing staff technical and administrative challenges
are expected to find the resources to report accurate
data and respond effectively to early signs of water
quality problems. Recently, the Democratic Alliance
(DA) used the Promotion of Access to Information
Act (PAIA) to gain access to WQMS water quality
reports in order to establish whether the deaths of
80 babies in Ukhahlamba in the Eastern Cape, were
directly related to contaminated water supplies.
According to the DA, 43 of 83 towns in Free State
“have at one stage or another received ‘code red’ ratings
according to the WQMS monthly drinking-water
quality summary reports, indicating the quality of the
water was dangerously compromised for a number of
consecutive months.”119
119 Hartley, W., “DA turns to law to get water reports.”
Business Day (3 July 2008): http://www.businessday.
Ekurhuleni municipality stated in its interview
that DWAF “regulates by providing municipalities
with guidelines and then walks away.” All of the
municipalities interviewed, besides Madibeng, stated
that that they play a role themselves in water quality
monitoring, with Madibeng stating that they have
a challenge with capacity and there are not enough
skilled people to conduct sampling, as well as cope
with the frequency of monthly monitoring. Lepelle-
Nkumpi mentioned DWAF as a major role player in
monitoring their water quality, and that Mvula Trust
assists in monitoring sanitation. It is clear, however,
that municipalities generally adopt a more reactionary
approach to water quality monitoring, as opposed
to proactive approaches which would foresee and
effectively counter emerging water quality problems
before they developed. According to Blouberg
Municipality’s IDP/Budget 2007/2008, the majority
of its population do not have access to clean water and
the majority of people receive their water from natural
sources, the quality of which is highly questionable.
Indeed, reactionary approaches by municipalities to the
monitoring of deteriorating and aging infrastructure,
and the testing of water quality, are a major cause of
water quality scares and disease outbreaks in South
Africa. Added to this is the uncertainty as to how
effective DWAF will be in future in coordinating
policies and projects with other departmental sectors
to ensure the safety of water quality in South Africa.
5.7.2. Inter-governmental and inter-
departmental issues
The responsibility for monitoring water quality is
shared between DWAF and the DoH and there
has been criticism as to the effective coordination
between these two departments in ensuring water
quality. Leading public health expert, Professor
David Sanders, recently stated that South African
co.za/articles/topstories.aspx?ID=BD4A795259.
Accessed 15 October 2008.
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health officials have failed to advocate for more free
water while efforts to improve sanitation have been
undermined by lack of funds, resulting in high levels
of disease and mortality mainly among the poor. He
stated that municipal environmental health officers,
who were supposed to facilitate the improvement of
conditions, were “inappropriate” and had been trained
to “inspect restaurants in middle-class suburbs.”120
Recently, over a hundred children died from drinking
allegedly contaminated water in Ukhahlamba in the
Eastern Cape.121 The alarming recent findings of an
investigation by the Standing Committee on Health
into the deaths in the Eastern Cape, revealed that
the provincial Health Department and Ukhahlamba
Municipality failed to prevent the deaths of babies due
to “ignorance on the part of officials.”122
Another problem with inter-governmental and inter-
departmental cooperation, as evidenced in the City of
Cape Town and Ekurhuleni, is that migration to urban
areas increases the densification of settlements and the
provision of water and sanitation services is strongly
linked with local, provincial and national departments
of housing, and their formalisation of settlements.
This creates the challenge of inter-governmental and
120 Thom, A., “Water and sanitation undermines health
efforts.” Health-e, (5 June 2008): http://allafrica.com/
stories/200806050798.html. Accessed 15 October
2008.
121 Mkhwanazi, S., “Baby deaths: department set
for talks. ” IOL (6 May 2008): http://www.iol.
co.za/index.php?set_id=1&click_id=13&art_
id=vn20080506121028412C860907. Accessed 15
October 2008. Also, two people died from cholera
recently in Kliptown, Soweto with residents pointing to
deep-seated problems related to poor sanitation facilities
and the lack of access to potable water in the area. See
“Cholera in Soweto.” IRIN (22 April 2008): http://
www.irinnews.org/Report.aspx?ReportId=77858.
Accessed 15 October 2008.
122 “Deaths of E Cape babies blamed on ignorance.” SABC
News (28 July 2008): http://www.sabcnews.com/
south_africa/health/0,2172,174175,00.html. Accessed
15 October 2008.
inter-departmental fragmentation and a common
competency crisis, whereby responsibility is delegated
back and forth between departments and the blame
for failure is often placed on local municipalities while
the people suffer from inaccessibility to adequate
water, sanitation and housing. This fragmentation is
also reflected in local water services departments’ scant
reference to the health-related issues of water services
and points to the broader structural problem of the
artificial detachment of water from health at the local
government level, itself a casualty of the constitutional
hierarchy in which water services are located at the
local level, while health services are located at the
provincial level.
5.7.3. Problems with local level
monitoring
All municipalities stated that they use the South African
National Standard Drinking Water Specification
241 (SANS 241); however municipalities differ on
the questions of who carries out the monitoring, how
often it occurs and where samples are taken.123 The
lack of skilled professionals at the local level is a major
problem for municipalities. According to a senior
water researcher at the Council for Scientific and
Industrial Research (CSIR), up to fifty percent of
municipalities do not even have one qualified engineer
on their staff.124 More capacitated municipalities
like City of Cape Town and Nelson Mandela Bay,
have their own water quality laboratories, while
other municipalities like Moses Kotane and Albert
123 For information on SANS 241 see DWAF, “Drinking
Water Quality Management Guide for Water
Service Authorities.” (September 2005): http://
www.dwaf.gov.za/Documents/Other/DWQM/
DWQMWSAGuideSept05.pdf.
124 Béga, S., “SA water quality is fast deteriorating.”
Pretoria News (22 September 2008): http://www.
iol.co.za/index.php?set_id=1&click_id=13&art_
id=vn20080922055620719C472879. Accessed 15
October 2008.
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64
Luthuli outsource this function and use private labs
or consultants to test water quality. Blouberg relies on
the Capricorn District Municipality and consultants
to test water quality while Dr J.S. Moroka has both
an internal team and an independent consultant who
monitor water quality.
Differences also exist in the frequency of water quality
testing, with Albert Luthuli Municipality and Dr
J.S. Moroka Municipality both stating that they take
daily samples, and Nelson Mandela Bay stating it
takes monthly samples. While City of Cape Town
has the capacity to take water quality samples at the
household level, Moses Kotane does not and simply
hires consultants to test at its treatment plants. Dr
J.S. Moroka Municipality officials stated that they do
not have sufficient personnel, equipment or vehicles
to deal with the required procedures for testing water
quality. Indeed, aging infrastructure and neglect of
O/M can contribute to hazardous water quality,
while unaffordable water tariffs and expensive water,
disconnections and restriction devices also contribute
to people gravitating to untreated and unsafe water
sources like rivers, streams and dams.
5.7.4. Deteriorating water quality in
South African dams
A recent research report by the Council for Scientific
and Industrial Research (CSIR) revealed that 11
percent of South Africa’s major dams have had
“significant to severe” problems with algal and
cyanobacterial blooms, which has been confirmed by
the Minister of Water Affairs Lindiwe Hendricks.
Toxic bacteria known to be harmful to human health
have been found in most of South Africa’s rivers
and reservoirs which supply most of South Africa’s
drinking water. The contamination is rapidly getting
worse due to controversial government water quality
guidelines that some scientists have opposed for
years.125 Among the worst affected water bodies are
125 Jordan, B., “Bacteria poisons dams and rivers.” The
Times (14 June 2008): http://www.thetimes.co.za/
PrintEdition/Article.aspx?id=785066. Accessed 15
October 2008.
the Shongweni and E J Smith dams in KwaZulu
Natal, and the CSIR’s researchers were also surprised
to find blooms in Midmar Dam during winter, the
first report of such a bloom in winter anywhere in
the country. The Umgeni/Midmar system supplies
about 45 percent of the drinking water in Durban
and Pietermaritzburg, however an Umgeni Water
spokesperson said tests showed no indication that any
treated water from Umgeni dams was contaminated
by these toxins. A recent written submission to
Parliament by Hendricks confirmed a major threat
of possible bacterial ‘blooms’ in 58 percent of dams
monitored by government water quality inspectors,
including Hartbeespoort and Rietvlei in Gauteng;
Shongweni outside Durban; and Theewaterskloof
and Voëlvlei in the Western Cape.126
While a CSIR spokesperson stated that there is
no need for panic and that people who drink water
treated by Umgeni Water and other large water
utilities have nothing to worry about, he added
that the research pointed to the need to intensify
monitoring procedures for toxic cyanobacteria in
South African dams, and possibly for new methods
to eliminate some of these bacteria during the water-
treatment process. Part of the problem is that cities like
Johannesburg and Pretoria generate large volumes of
sewerage, which even if treated in municipal treatment
works eventually ended up in rivers and dams where
the water became artificially enriched or eutrophied.
If people are exposed to this water, it is potentially
extremely harmful often causing death. Although
there is treatment that is effective in removing the
poisons, this method of treatment is expensive and
not all wastewater treatment plants in South Africa
are equipped with this technology.127
126 Ibid.
127 Carnie, T., “Researchers warn of hidden dangers.”
Cape Times (24 July 2008): http://www.iol.co.za/
index.php?art_id=vn20080724062424746C963343.
Accessed 15 October 2008.
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5.7.5. Conclusion and
recommendations on water
quality
In many countries, water quality is managed by the
health, rather than the water, department. In South
Africa there has been a somewhat unsatisfactory
division of responsibility between health and water
departments but, until recently, DWAF has been
relatively successful at ensuring high water quality
standards across the country. However, there is
evidence that DWAF’s system of water quality
management is under strain and requires urgent
attention to avert further water contamination and
related deaths.
DWAF also needs to address the deteriorating water
quality in dams and to ensure uniform compliance
with water quality standards across municipalities.
We fear that the new certification scheme, especially if
focused merely at naming and shaming non-complying
municipalities, will not address the root causes of the
problem, which relate to insufficient financial and
technical assistance, as well as human capacity, at the
local government level.
5.8. Water Demand Management
(WDM)
Water Demand Management (WDM) is broadly a
water conservation mandate, and is a shift from the
supply to the demand side of water services provision,
focussing on the sustainability and management
of water as a scarce resource rather than on the
extension of new infrastructure. However, with their
preoccupation on cost-recovery, municipalities do not
necessarily promote water conservation at the expense
of gaining more revenue from high water consumption.
When asked if there was any conflict between the
WSP wanting to maximise profits and municipality
wanting to conserve resources, most municipalities
had no answer, however Witzenberg indicated that
it would welcome households to use more water to
increase their income. This fault line deals with:
the false dichotomy drawn between water
conservation and social justice goals;
the need for WDM strategies to be based on
current and accurate data that includes reference
to historical inequalities;
the ineffectiveness of municipalities in addressing
water leaks; and
the lack of water conservation education within
municipalities.
The National Water Audit requires WSAs to prepare
water conservation and water demand management
strategies in order to achieve the efficient use of water.
Formal WDM policies and strategies are in place
in eThekwini, City of Cape Town, Ekurhuleni and
Nelson Mandela Bay, with Lepelle-Nkumpi stated
that a task team had been put in place to look at
WDM and the municipality expressed a strong desire
to understand water demand because of the increasing
pressures that rapidly expanding development and
growth in the area is having on them. Witzenberg also
stated that they have a Water Conservation and Water
Demand Management Plan in development. Many
municipalities are struggling to eradicate backlogs
in water services provision, and are put under more
pressure by an environment of limited financial and
technical resources, environmental factors which cause
water shortages, and rapidly increasing development
and demand in their jurisdictions.
5.8.1. False dichotomy drawn between
water conservation and social
justice goals
In essence, WDM highlights the ongoing tension
between ‘red’ and ‘green’ justice. ‘Red justice’ describes
social justice, which prioritises the poor and their
socio-economic needs, while ‘green justice’ refers to the
prioritisation of the environment and its sustainability
i.e. environmental justice. The South African water
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66
services management paradigm tends to pit the two
objectives against each other, especially at the local
level, where constraining poor people’s access to water
is sometimes posited as having an environmental
justice objective.128
It is important to note from the outset that ‘red’
priorities need not compromise ‘green’ ones,
particularly in relation to water consumption by
poor people. A recent submission made by the
Environmental Monitoring Group (EMG) to the
Parliamentary Portfolio Committee on Water Affairs
and Forestry, stated that:
We fully support water demand management as a
means of reducing water consumption and limiting
the need for new water supply sources. Indeed, it is a
critical response to climate change. However… there
are ways in which it can (and has) been abused. The
most common, is as an excuse to limit poor people’s
access to water. For example, in many municipalities
across the country, we see that Free Basic Water of
6kl per household per month, which was supposed
to be a minimum, has de facto become a maximum.
Pricing or technology restricts additional water use.
More and more, the reason local governments provide
is that we need to conserve water. What they really
mean is we need to conserve water that is not income-
generating. High end (paying) water users are not
restricted in the same way – the rich can waste. And
so the dual goals of WDM and cost recovery can be
contradictory.
129
128 For example, the City of Johannesburg’s project to
curtail water consumption-related losses in Soweto is
called Operation Gcin’Amanzi (Operation Conserve
Water), but the accompanying rollout of PPMs was
recognised by Judge Tsoka to be aimed at credit control,
rather than water conservation, and it is clear that there
are no water conservation measures in place in rich
suburbs, where they should be located (Mazibuko
judgment, at note 33).
129 Environmental Monitoring Group (EMG),
“Parliamentary presentation on the Legislative Review.”
Submitted by Jessica Wilson to the Parliamentary
Portfolio Committee on Water Affairs and Forestry
‘Green’ concerns over water conservation should be
focused on hedonistic water users like agriculture and
industry, and rich households, and not poor domestic
consumers who, in any event, use only a fraction of
total water consumed in South Africa, and who
should be encouraged to access sufficient water to
meet their basic needs for health and dignity reasons.
One mechanism for appropriate WDM, which
reflects green and red objectives, is to utilise very high
tariffs at the top end of the tariff curve, to deter rich
households from hedonistic consumption.130 This
is more difficult to affect in very poor municipalities
that do not have rich households and in such areas,
national government will have to intervene to ensure
that red and green objectives are met.
5.8.2. Need to base WDM strategies on
accurate data
There is a clear need for water services and WDM
strategies to be planned and undertaken according
to current and accurate population data, which take
into account areas of poverty and historical inequality.
Without such information, it is not possible to
develop an effective and equitable WDM strategy.
One of the WDM challenges, and a critical problem
in the extension of FBW, is that, the principle of ‘the
more you use, the more you pay’, does not recognise
the apartheid-inherited spatial dynamics (especially
in urban areas) of densely populated, multi-dwelling,
(13 August 2008), p. 2: http://www.pmg.org.za/files/
docs/080813emg.doc.
130 As already mentioned, there is a need for further
research into the effect on high-end consumers of
raising tariffs. From existing studies in Durban and
Hermanus, it appears that quite substantial tariff hikes
at the top end, which could sustain cross-subsidisation
at the low end and contribute to municipal revenue,
might result in some decrease in water consumption.
The process of determining what level of tariff hike
leads to the necessary amount of water conservation
among hedonistic water users, without damaging
overall revenue, needs to be an iterative one.
67
households. This needs to be taken into account when
developing WDM (and FBW) strategies.
Cape Town provides an example of carelessly
implemented WDM. According to Laïla Smith, the
decision to implement a WDM strategy in the City
of Cape Town emanated from influx into the city and
rapid growth and development, which created a volatile
situation of increasing demand with limited available
finances. She states that “the implementation of WDM
strategies in Cape Town ignored the spatial legacy of
apartheid where the highest poverty rates in the city
are in high density households living in township areas
with historical underinvestment in infrastructure.”
High density households in these areas obviously
consume more water and also pay high monthly bills
due to water leaks in deteriorating infrastructure.131
The adverse effect of the WDM policy was to penalise
vulnerable and poor communities without applying it
in a potentially more viable and effective manner to
wealthy communities.
5.8.3. Municipal ineffectiveness in
addressing water leaks
An important issue to note is that a vast amount of
water is lost each day due to water leaks, burst pipes
and construction-related ‘accidents.’ This suggests
that, an even more important aspect of WDM than
tariffs is the timeous repairing of leaks, as well as the
updating of infrastructure. A recent article published
in the “Metro Watch” section of The Star explained
that in a rich suburb in Johannesburg, a burst water
pipe (on public property) had been left unattended
for three weeks even after immediately being
brought to the attention of the City’s water provider,
Johannesburg Water (Pty) Ltd. According to a
concerned citizen, who happened to be a consulting
engineer, he estimated the amount of water left
131 Smith, L., “The Murky Waters of Second Wave
Neoliberalism: Corporatization as a Service Delivery
Model in Cape Town”, at note 98, p.177.
running in the road to be the equivalent of 765 m3 per
hour, which is approximately 21,655kl per day at a
cost of about R248,166 per day. Running for 21 days,
this means that the City has lost over R5 million’s
worth of water due to one leak in one suburb. The
454,755kl of wasted potable water is the equivalent
of the monthly household FBW allocation (6kl) of
over 75,792 households (which is more than the entire
population of Moses Kotane Municipality).132 This
incident illustrates the vast water losses that can result
in one leak, and the importance for municipalities to
have a swift and effective response to any reported
leaks within its jurisdiction.
Clearly, water conservation is not only about attempting
to reduce water demand and teaching poor residential
users to use water sparingly, it is also about ensuring
that rich households and large industrial consumers of
water are complying with the same principles, and that
the municipality is in a position to immediately rectify
major water losses and ensure proper maintenance of
infrastructure.
5.8.4. Lack of water conservation
education
One recurring theme that arose during our research
was the non-existent, limited or ad hoc approach
of most municipalities towards water conservation
education and public participation. By this we are
not referring to attempts to limit poor household
consumption to the FBW amount (which we see as
primarily a credit control objective), but rather to
general information about water consumption and
conservation and, in particular, attempts to educate
rich consumers about conserving water and curbing
hedonistic consumption.
Our research suggests that most ‘water conservation
education’ is focused at poor people, creating the
132 Flanagan, L., “When Water is Money”, The Star (1
August 2008).
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unavoidable impression that it is really aimed at credit
control rather than water conservation per se (which
would be much more effectively focused on the
heavy water users like rich households and business,
industry, agriculture etc). Moses Kotane Municipality
mentioned no specific mechanisms in place for water
conservation education; however the 2006/07 IDP
does mention that R450,000 was allocated for the
“education of toilet users.” Albert Luthuli Municipality
stated that at present there is no public education on
water conservation; however this will be addressed in
its WSDP, while Witzenberg stated that it does not
have any mechanisms in place, DWAF is formulating
a plan to educate community development workers
(CDWs) who will in turn educate communities
with regards to water consumption. Lepelle-Nkumpi
said that it uses the IDP forums to promote water
conservation, as well as local radio stations, During
the annual National Water Week, Madibeng stated
that it invites schools and communities to learn about
water conservation and Nelson Mandela Bay stated
that together with DWAF it has been involved in
the promotion of National Water Week, and that
in 2005, 3,500 primary school learners visited Water
Week stalls erected to promote awareness around
water conservation. The municipality also stated that
the recent drought in the area led to a huge publicity
campaign to encourage people to reduce their water
consumption and to promote the efficient use of
water.
By far the most progressive in terms of water
conservation education is the City of Cape Town,
which has a water conservation section which
promotes education around efficient water usage, and
disseminates relevant material in English, Afrikaans
and Xhosa. The City’s ‘Hlonipha Amanzi’ campaign
is a proactive education awareness campaign run
primarily in informal settlements with the aim to
ensure that water is not wasted when fully serviced
plots are provided, and to deal with issues around
wastage prior to them occurring. The City also has
a ‘FixIt Leaks Programme’ which targets indigent
homes, properties under the value of R100,000, with
unusually high water consumption and prioritises the
largest-volume users in this category to fix leaks. As
an incentive, it is agreed that arrears will be written
off should the owner keep a leak-free property for six
months after the repair is complete.
5.8.5. Conclusion and
recommendations on WDM
It is clear from our research that water leaks and
inferior water infrastructure need to be addressed
as a matter of priority, as does the issue of ongoing
maintenance of infrastructure. Furthermore, water
demand audits that provide an analysis of assets and
promote engagement with communities need to be
undertaken by municipalities in order to understand
the complex relationship between long-term supply
and demand. Such information needs to form the
basis of both FBS and tariff structure formulation,
in a way that satisfies ‘green’ and ‘red’ objectives. As
the national regulator, DWAF could intervene to
assist under-capacitated municipalities to develop
appropriate WDM strategies, which ensure that
poor households have access to enough water to
sustain a healthy and dignified life, and that large
consumers like industry, agriculture and hedonistic
residential consumers are penalised for their excessive
consumption. Water conservation education should
be undertaken in all areas, with the ultimate goal to
ensure access to adequate and safe water for all and to
curb hedonistic water consumption.
5.9. Public Participation
Although critical to the issue of equitable water services
provision, the debate around the desirability or need
for public participation and consultation in water
services provision is one that has not been explored
extensively in this research (and, to our knowledge,
not elsewhere either). One view in this debate holds
that the water sector requires such specialised and
technical knowledge and expertise that the general
public’s participation would be largely ineffective in
the planning process. In this view, decision-making
regarding water services should be left to the ‘experts’
who understand water reticulation and the intricate
management system of the water sector, and thus
know best how to deliver water services.
69
In the other view, public participation is viewed as
vital to establishing trust between water services users
and the various institutions, which are tasked with
delivering these services. It is worth remembering
that the apartheid government was characterised
by an administration that established exclusionary
institutions, including those providing water and
sanitation, fostering distrust among the majority
of the population who did not benefit from these
services. Since 1994, the transformation process of the
water sector has largely been a top-down, technocratic
one which has entrenched the precedent of skewed
privilege and power in access to water resources.133
Without the conscious involvement of communities
in the planning, provision and sustainability of water
services, the inequalities and exclusionary practices
of the water sector will continue to be perpetuated,
and water users will continue to distrust and feel
alienated from water services institutions and their
‘technicist’ language.134 The interests and concerns of
poor and predominately black residents of townships
and informal settlements are often overlooked by
water management planning forums, which prioritise
input from technicians, commercial farmers and
local water policy elites amongst others.135 The time
burden and effects of poverty are greatly increased for
women, as they are forced to fetch water from far and
are household caregivers, often to family members
with HIV/AIDS, without access to adequate water
and sanitation. Input from water users in rural,
poor communities, particularly from women who
are greatly impacted by poor water accessibility and
quality would provide valuable information as to what
133 Goldin, J., “It takes two to tango: steps towards change
in the water sector.” In Hemson, D., et al (eds.), Poverty
and Water: Explorations of the Reciprocal Relationship
(London, 2008), p. 52.
134 Ibid., p. 53.
135 Ibid., p. 54.
levels of services would be successful given specific
contexts and demands of communities.136
5.9.1. Problems with how
municipalities currently facilitate
public participation
A preliminary case study report on cross-cutting issues
in water services provision, by The Water Dialogues
found that municipalities are not clear about the
meaning of or the need for public participation, with
negative consequences for service delivery.137 The
report states that while “call centres are a means for
users to register complaints, these differ substantially
from communication to communities, and public
participation as a two way process.” However, when
asked about public participation, municipalities point
to them as an indication of their responsiveness to
communities.138 In the course of our research we
experienced the same responses from local government
officials.
More research into public participation in water
services processes is required but it appeared from our
research that the main vehicles for public participation
– ward committees and input into IDP processes –
are often not capable of holding local government
accountable and are often ‘rubber stamps’ more than
anything else. The predominant trend among the
interviewed municipalities (which included Moses
Kotane, Madibeng, Albert Luthuli, Dr J.S. Moroka,
Blouberg, Msunduzi, Amathole and Stellenbosch)
is to confine any attempts to incorporate public
participation, to the use of ward committees and
the IDP processes. There are problems with both of
these vehicles. Ward committees tend to be highly
political, reflecting local power and political elites, and
136 See Hemson, D., “Easing the burden on women?
Water, cholera and poverty in South Africa”, at note
133.
137 The Water Dialogues, “Preliminary Discussion
Document”, at note 53, p. 32.
138 Ibid.
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not providing much voice to marginalised groups, and
the IDP processes are overwhelmingly disempowering
and technocratic.
EThekwini Municipality acknowledged in its
interview that ward committees are often not the most
effective way for communities to participate in water
and sanitation issues. Another problem with these
particular structures is the ineffectiveness of the ward
councillors to represent and participate meaningfully
in water sector planning due to a lack of education,
information and context on often technical and complex
water sector issues and processes, for example the role
and importance of the WSDP. As has mentioned
in part 5.6.4, it is often the case that councillors are
illiterate and do not have an understanding of their
roles, responsibilities or local government mechanisms,
which is greatly hindering service delivery at municipal
level.139
The IDP process does not seem to offer much more
potential for facilitating active participation in the
water services arena. Moses Kotane Municipality
stated that it uses the IDP process to address the needs
of the community, but that meetings held for the IDP
are not well attended because they are held during
the day and most people live in rural areas and find
it difficult to attend. According to the municipality,
those who do attend when transport is provided,
generally contribute very little. In Lepelle-Nkumpi,
each village has a 10 member water committee which
reports to the ward councillor who then reports to the
Technical Director, who gives a report on all water
issues which have been raised by water committees
from the villages. This then gets heard at the Water
Forum, which reported to the Portfolio Committee
and then the District Water Sector Forum (which
meets every second month), and is ultimately filtered
through to the Mayor and eventually the Premier. In
Nelson Mandela Bay the Constituency Office (which
facilitates the ward system and liaises with councillors)
and the Communications Office (which deals with
external communications) together handle public
participation in the municipality.
139 Mbanjwa, X., “Municipality literacy shock”, at note
113.
Another aspect of public participation in water
services provision is the way in which municipalities
deal with complaints and queries from their users.
This report does not extensively cover issues around
public participation and community involvement in
dispute resolution; however we have identified this
as an area that requires more in-depth and nuanced
research. In terms of lodging a complaint or querying
a bill, the approaches that municipalities take differ
considerably. In some cases people are able to lodge
a complaint online or phone a toll free hotline and be
attended to almost immediately, whereas in others
people have to make a long and expensive journey to
the municipal office in order to make a representation
which is sometimes required to be in written form. In
Madibeng, we were told that if there is a complaint
the community can report it to the appropriate ward
councillor or ward committee member, who then
reports to the municipality or to the WSP.
5.9.2. Conclusion and
recommendations on public
participation
Municipalities and water institutions must be held
publicly accountable, and they should actively
incorporate input from communities and water
users to this end. Civil society can play an important
role in educating and capacitating communities in
issues around water and sanitation services, through
workshops on topics ranging from water rights to
water budget monitoring. The more empowered
communities and users are regarding the water sector,
the more engagement and debate can occur with the
‘technical experts.’ Indeed, knowledge is a crucial
resource for improving participation.140 The input of
previously excluded communities needs to be actively
and meaningfully incorporated into water policy
and implementation, rather than simply existing
stagnantly in the vague rhetoric of IDPs and WSDPs,
under the politically-correct guise of ‘empowerment’
and ‘participation.’141
140 Goldin, J., “It takes two to tango: steps towards change
in the water sector ”, at note 133, p. 60.
141 Ibid., p. 61.
71
142
143
142 “Case Study 2 - Porto Alegre, Brazil: Participatory
Approaches in Budgeting and Public Expenditure
Management.” Social Development Notes, 71 (March
2003), p. 3: http://info.worldbank.org/etools/docs/
library/205481/Porto%20Alegre_English.pdf.
143 Ibid.
AND BUDGETING IN PORTE ALEGRE, BRAZIL
An interesting example of local participatory
planning used to improve water services access
can be found in the Participatory Budget policy
implemented in Porte Alegre, Brazil. The model
developed in Porte Alegre has since been replicated
in 300 municipalities in Brazil and the United
Kingdom is looking into implementing a similar
initiative. From 1990 to 2005, at the beginning of each
year, neighbourhood assemblies set budget priorities
and elect 44 members to a Council of Participatory
Budgeting, essentially the main participatory
institution. This Council then negotiates with the
local authority. Budget allocations are made by
combining subjective preferences of citizens with
the objective quantitative criteria. Between 1989
and 1996, the number of households with access to
water services rose from 80 percent to 98 percent
and the percentage of the population served by the
municipal sewerage system rose from 46 percent to
85 percent.
142
A spin-off of the initiative is that a notable change
in the attitudes of technical staff, well-versed in
matters of budgeting and engineering, was observed
as a result of their increasing interface with
‘ordinary’ citizens. A change in the way technical
staff communicated with communities was also
observed, with staff attempting to make themselves
understood in simple language, and lively debates
occurring between the delegates and staff over the
latter’s technical criteria and solutions proposed.
143
The fact that some information continues to be
withheld from delegates in the pretext of technicality,
despite attempts to make much of that accessible,
remains a problem but at least a dialogue and a
space has been opened to interact meaningfully.
More progressive methods to facilitate public
participation are used in eThekwini and City of Cape
Town, where both municipalities have recognised the
problems associated with ward committees and opted
for more inclusive and participative methods through
the Raising the Citizens’ Voice Project.144 While there are
valid criticisms of the actual inclusive participation
aspect of these initiatives, they are worthwhile
endeavours and undoubtedly an improvement on
simply relying on flawed ward committees and IDP
processes.145 In order for public participation to be
more effective in practice there also needs to be a
deconstruction of what is meant by ‘communities.’
While water policies and legislation promote the
recognition of different types of water users and stress
pro-poor policies, the structures and institutions
established to facilitate meaningful participation need
to take into account socio-economic differences and
recognise that, all too often, the voices and input from
the poorest communities are ignored.
144 Msunduzi stated that it has a Raising the Citizens’
Voice Project in development.
145 The City of Cape Town’s Raising Citizen’s Voice
Project during 2008 entailed 10 workshops of three
hours, conducted in English, Afrikaans or Xhosa in
18 communities, covering a range of topics including
citizens’ rights and responsibilities; using water wisely
and meter reading; sanitation and hygiene; pollution
abatement and water quality; tariffs, billing and
affordability.
Fault Lines
FIVE
Water Services Fault Lines
Six
Conclusion and Recommendations
Although the fault lines identified above have been
analysed separately, issues around public participation,
water quality, credit control, water disconnections,
tariff structures, FBS, institutional capacity, financial
and technical assistance, backlogs, levels of service,
water quality and WDM all feed into each other and
speak to the many challenges and constraints currently
facing municipalities in providing domestic water
services. What was obvious from the interviews with
the fifteen municipalities is that, despite recognition
of the obligation to provide FBS and facilitate pro-
poor development, there is an underlying antagonistic
and paternalistic attitude towards the poor within a
prevailing cost-recovery preoccupation.
While cost-recovery and social justice concerns
are potentially compatible – if water is approached
essentially as a public service for poor communities,
and as a commercial product (to be bought and sold
for profit) for rich households, businesses, industry
and agriculture – our research suggests that, mainly
as a result of insufficient financial and technical
support to municipalities from national government,
the balance is firmly tilted in favour of cost-recovery.
In an environment of limited national assistance,
municipalities are often forced to focus on short-term
measures, even if these make no sense developmentally
and ultimately cost more in the medium- and long-
term. There is a tendency to favour once-off technical
‘solutions’ that appear to reduce administrative and
maintenance burdens, such as water restriction devices,
rather than trying to find creative and equitable ways
to ensure adequate access to water services for all.
If water services are to be approached according to
DWAF’s 2003 Strategic Framework, i.e. ‘water is
life, sanitation is dignity’, then the issues raised by
municipalities and discussed in the fault lines above
are serious and urgent.
It is clear from our research that the goal of universal
access to water services will never be achieved within
the existing decentralised model. There is a pressing
need for much greater involvement, support and
oversight from national government. In this respect,
current developments towards establishing a national
water services regulator are to be encouraged. However,
it remains to be seen how effective DWAF will be in
its new role as the national regulator, and what other
interventions by relevant stakeholders can be made
to address these issues and mitigate the problems. In
the meantime, and anyway, based on our research we
recommend the following:
Greater financial and technical support to
municipalities, including funds and deployment
of personnel, especially where poor municipalities
are under-spending but not reducing
their backlogs quickly enough, and where
municipalities have limited potential to raise
internal revenue through cross-subsidisation with
rich water users.
National regulation of all water tariffs to ensure
equitable reflection of social and |
environmental justice objectives, and
a price cap for the first tariff block/s following
|
the FBW block across all municipalities
i.e. to ensure uniformly low tariffs for low
consumption and to get away from the
situation in which poor people in the poorest
municipalities often have to pay higher prices
for water than in richer municipalities.
National regulation of credit control practices to
ensure
fair enforcement between different classes of
|
water users, including the establishment of
pro-poor policies on disconnections, and
prohibition of PPMs and other pernicious
|
water restriction devices in poor communities.
More effective national regulation of water
quality control.
Research into consumption, costs and
affordability of water services across low-income
households.
72
Research into ways to effectively cross-subsidise
across bands of domestic water users, including
an investigation of elasticity of demand at the
different levels of consumption.
Prioritisation of efforts to eradicate all backlogs
and advance levels of service, including
finalising and implementing an appropriate
|
FBSan policy, and
implementing an adequate
|per person per day
FBW allocation across all municipalities,
starting with a national minimum amount of
50 lcd.
Abandonment of using the indigent policy and
register to allocate FBS.
SIX Conclusion and Recommendations
73
Water Services Fault Lines
Seven
Appendices
Appendix 7.1. Basic statistical information for the 15 municipalities
Name of
Municipality
Province
Population
No. of
Households
Poverty
Rate %
Density
Type
Albert Luthuli Mpumalanga 187 936 41 234 67.4 Predominantly rural
Amathole District Eastern Cape 1 664 482 424 795 63.6 Predominantly Rural
Blouberg Limpopo 161 322 35 176 73.5 Rural
Cape Town Western Cape 2 892 243 778 237 23.6 Urban metro
Cape Winelands
District Western Cape 630 493 160 100 22.8 Mixed
Dr J.S. Moroka Mpumalanga 243 313 54 339 66.0 Predominantly rural
Ekurhuleni Gauteng 2 478 631 776 470 36.6 Urban metro
eThekwini Kwazulu Natal 3 090 122 824 371 - Urban metro
Lepelle-Nkumpi Limpopo 227 971 52 928 65.5 Predominantly rural
Madibeng North West 346 677 100 457 47.2 Predominantly rural
Moses Kotane North West 237 175 62 940 58.6 Rural
Msunduzi Kwazulu Natal 552 838 135 329 43.1 Mixed
Nelson Mandela
Bay Eastern Cape 1 005 779 265 375 41.4 Urban metro
Stellenbosch Western Cape 118 710 35 124 16.8 Mixed
Witzenberg Western Cape 83 568 20 459 26.8 Mixed
Source: The Gaffney Group, Gaffney’s Local Government in South Africa 2007-2008 Official Yearbook. (Johannesburg, April 2007).
Appendix 7.2. Indigent vs. non-indigent water consumption
Municipality
a) No. of
blocks
b) Charge
per kl for
second block
(indigents)
c) Price/
month for
indigents/
poor to
consume
12kl
d) Price/
month to
consume
12kl
e) %
f) FBW
146
Moses
Kotane
3 R6.88 R41.28 R41.28 100% *6kl
Madibeng 10 R3.76 R22.56 R22.56 100% *6kl
Albert
Luthuli
5 R3.0468 R18.2808 R18.2808 100% *6kl
Dr J.S.
Moroka
4 R1.60 R9.70 (metered)
R15 (non-metered)
R3.30 (destitute)
R27.30 (metered)
R16 (non-metered)
35%
93%
6kl147
74
Lepelle-
Nkumpi
4 R4.56 R22.50 (metered)
R26 (non-metered)
R57.60 (metered)
R67 (non-metered)
39%
39%
*6kl
Blouberg 6 R2.51 R15.06 R29.40 51% 6kl (i)
Ekurhuleni 6 R6.27 R18.81
Free (communal
standpipes)
R37.62 (metered)
R54 (non-metered)
50%
0%
*6kl
9kl (i)
Nelson
Mandela Bay
3 R4.49 R17.96 (metered)
R26.79 (formal
unmetered)
R13.40 (informal
unmetered)
R8.13 (communal
standpipe or bucket)
R53.88 (metered) 33%
49%
25%
15%
8kl (i)
City of Cape
Town
6 R3.05 Free (effectively 13kl) R18.30 0% 6kl148 (i)
eThekwini 3 R5.45(semi)
R8.22 (full)
R49.32 (full pressure)
R32.70 (semi pressure)
Free (low pressure)
R113.43 (full pressure)
R32.70 (semi pressure)
43%
100%
*6kl149
Amathole:
Mbhashe
Mnquma
Great Kei
Amahlathi
Ngqushwa
Nkonkobe
Nxuba
5
R4.30
R3.60
R3.20
R4.30
R4.60
R3.50
R3.00
R28.20
R22.00
R19.60
R26.80
R28.40
R22.00
R18.60
R50.20
R41.20
R37.60
R50.80
R52.40
R40.00
R34.20
56%
53%
52%
53%
54%
55%
54%
6kl (i)
Msunduzi 2
3
R9.04 (auto)
R3.49 (appl)
R54.24 (automatic)
R20.94 (applied)
R108.48 50%
19%
*6kl150
Stellenbosch 4 R3.48 R20.88 R36.60 57% 6kl (i)
Witzenberg 5
2
R3.70
R3.50
R22.20 (uncontrolled) 151
R21.00 (controlled)
R81.10 (uncontrolled)
R42.00 (controlled)
27%
50%
6kl (i)
146 * = FBW available to everyone; (i) = FBW available to indigents only
147 Dr J.S Moroka: 6kl is provided in the policy but FBW has not been successfully rolled out
148 City of Cape Town: 6kl FBW and R30 grant is provided to indigents which effectively makes it 13kl FBW.
149 eThekwini: 6kl to be increased to 9kl in July 2008.
150 Msunduzi: 6kl FBW is allocated to everyone but the 6kl FBW falls away for non-indigents if they consume more than 6kl
per month.
151 Witzenberg: Households with an in-house tap must pay the flat rate of R45.70 per month, however this is waived for
those with a communal tap or fixed amount.
SEVEN Appendices
75
Water Services Fault Lines
76
Appendix 7.3. Sanitation provision across the 15 municipalities
Municipality
Domestic sanitation
provision (at rate,
plot size, tariff for kl
consumed)
FBSan provided and
how much?
FBSan applicable to
whom?
Moses Kotane Flat rate only charged in two areas
R14 and R4.50
No -
Madibeng Plot size
0 - 300m² = R45.81
300 – 1 000m² = R8.21 (for each additional
100m² or part thereof)
1 000 - 2 500m² = R9.49 (as above)
2 500 - 25 000m² = R4.70 (as above)
Yes, less 20% of
sanitation charge
(R9.16)
Indigents
Albert Luthuli Flat rate
R85
Sanitation subsidies
apparently available
Indigents
Dr J.S. Moroka Flat rate
R20 (full waterborne)
R70 (drainage of septic tank)
R20 (unmetered)
No -
Lepelle-Nkumpi 3 block tariff structure based on plot size
0 – 500m² = R15
501-1000m² = R20
1000m² and above = R25
R7.50 flat rate
(effective 50% subsidy)
Indigents
Blouberg Flat rate
R34.73
No -
Ekurhuleni 6 block tariff structure
0 - 6kl = free
7 -15kl = R3.80 /kl
16 - 30kl = R1.55 /kl
31 - 45kl = R1.45 /kl
46 - 60kl = R1.40 /kl
61kl or more = 0.50 /kl
Flat rates for unmetered sewerage disposal
system
R34.20 ( (consumption less than 15k/month)
R64.20 (consumption between 15 – 30kl/
month)
R125.40 (consumption exceeding 30kl/month)
Yes, 6kl FBSan All
77
Nelson Mandela
Bay
A hydraulic sewerage tariff system is used based
on the formula P = KVC (where P = Sewerage
charge in rand, K = Effluent discharge factor,
V = Metered volume of potable water utilized
and C = Prescribed charge). K is different
for consumer categories (K = 0.6 for single
residential and small multiple dwellings; K
= 0.95 for larger multiple dwellings). The
prescribed charge (C) for 2007/2008 is R6.26 /
kl (incl. VAT). V is a minimum of 11 kill and
a maximum of 50 kill for single residential and
multiple dwellings. For 2007/2008 the charge
for unmetered potable water supply in a formal
structure is R41.32 per month, for an informal
structure with waterborne sewerage it is R41.32
per month (incl. VAT) and the bucket system
is R69.99 per month (incl. VAT).
Yes, 11kl FBSan Indigents (those on
ATTP policy)
City of Cape Town Fixed charges for sanitation based on the
municipal value of property. All properties with
a municipal value of less than R100 000 and
informal settlements do not have a fixed charge.
0 - 4.2kl = free
4.2 - 8.4kl = R3.78 /kl
8.4 - 28kl = R8.04 /kl
14 – 28kl = R8.79 /kl
28 – 35kl = R9.23 /kl
Domestic clusters (multi residential unit
developments) are provided with 4.2kl free
sanitation (on provision of an affidavit stating
number of units) and thereafter the tariff is
R9.10 /kl.
Yes, 4.2kl FBSan
Indigents
eThekwini Property value Those with property
value less than R36 000
receive free sewerage.
A system of rising
block rebates is granted
to properties valued
between R36 000 and
R100 000.
Those who qualify
Amathole 5 block tariff structure for kl consumed per
month
Yes, 6kl FBSan Those at RDP or
lower level of service
or those registered as
indigent
SEVEN Appendices
Water Services Fault Lines
78
Msunduzi Fixed charge
R76.37 tariff and a basic charge of R38.18
Free sewerage for
automatic indigents.
Applied indigents
receive a reduced
sanitation tariff.
Automatic and applied
indigents
Stellenbosch Fixed charge based on plot size
1 - 250m² = R497
251 – 500m² = R638
and 100m² blocks up to 1000 which is
R1037.59 with R100 for every additional
500m².
Yes, 6kl FBSan Indigents
Witzenberg Fixed monthly charge is R14.70 for septic tanks
and R92.50 for full waterborne service. VIP
level of service is free.
Basic monthly
charges for water
and sanitation are
subsidised.
Indigents
DJ du Plessis Building,
West Campus, Wits, Braamfontein
Private Bag 3, Wits University 2050
South Africa
Tel: + 27 11 717 8600
Fax: + 27 11 717 1702
www.law.wits.ac.za/cals
Right to Water Programme
83 rue de Montbrillant 1202,
Geneva, Switzerland
Tel: + 41 22 734 1028
Fax: + 41 22 733 8336
www.cohre.org/water
South Africa Programme
PO Box 6706, St. Olavs Plass,
NO-0130, Oslo, Norway
Tel: + 47 22 84 20 01
Fax: + 47 22 84 20 02
http://www.humanrights.uio.no/english/
This report presents the findings of a survey of water services across 15 South African
municipalities, conducted by the Centre for Applied Legal Studies (CALS), the Centre on Housing
Rights and Evictions (COHRE) and the Norwegian Centre for Human Rights (NCHR). The research
findings reflect systemic obstacles to the provision of universal access to water services across
the country, thus compromising everyone’s water and sanitation-related rights.
The report outlines some key recommendations to overhaul water services delivery in South
Africa, around cross-cutting ‘fault lines’ which include: eliminating backlogs and improving levels
of service; Free Basic Services (FBS); indigent policy as the FBS targeting mechanism; tariff
structures; credit control enforcement – water disconnections and restriction devices; financial
and technical assistance; water quality; water demand management; and public participation.
Marc Dettmann
