Minister of Water and Sanitation Senzo Mchunu will not ask President Cyril Ramaphosa to declare a National State of Disaster to address the deterioration and collapse of waste water treatment plants.
Mchunu said municipalities receive billions of rands a year to fix water infrastructure and that money should be used for that purpose.
He also said to address the collapsing water infrastructure he will table the Water Services Amendment Bill that only entities with water licences can operate waste water treatment plants.
However, Mchunu felt there was no need to ask Ramaphosa to declare a national State of Disaster to deal with the water infrastructure crisis.
Many waste water treatment plants are in a dire situation.
Mchunu said there was not need to ask Ramaphosa to intervene.
“The Department of Water and Sanitation is not of the view that the President should declare a National State of Disaster based on the deterioration of waste water treatment facilities to facilitate an urgent revamp of sanitation infrastructure across the country,” said Mchunu.
“Municipalities are allocated funding in terms of the Division of Revenue Act, and various grants from national government which are all intended towards development of infrastructure that is the responsibility of municipalities, including water and sanitation infrastructure.”
He said his department allocated R12 billion to municipalities for regional bulk water infrastructure and water services infrastructure grant in the current financial year.
Mchunu said in addition to this, municipalities were given R6.6bn by the department of cooperative governance and traditional affairs as part of the infrastructure grant.
Another R2.6bn was allocated to metros by the department of human settlements as part of the urban settlement grant, said Mchunu who was replying to a written parliamentary question from Democratic Alliance MP Nicholas Myburgh.
“For the current financial year municipalities have also been allocated R40bn through the equitable share for water and sanitation,” said Mchunu.
“Apart from these grants, the water sector has to be self-financing through revenues from the sale of water and services rendered to users. Water sector institutions must be financially viable and sustainable through implementation of user charges and sound revenue collection systems,” he said.
“A portion of these revenues should then be utilised for the ongoing operation and maintenance of sanitation infrastructure so that wastewater treatment plants and associated infrastructure do not fall into disrepair.”
He said the problem with waste water treatment plants was lack of maintenance.
Late former Minister of Water Affairs Edna Molewa warned many years ago that municipalities were not using water infrastructure grants to maintain water treatment plants.
She also said they would need R300 billion to fix water infrastructure in the country.
siyabonga.mkhwanazi@inl.co.za
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