The Democratic Alliance (DA) is deeply concerned about the looming water catastrophe in Tshwane and the ANC government’s inability to take responsibility.
Reports indicate that vast areas of the City could run dry within a month or two, a direct result of the City’s non-revenue water loss, which has skyrocketed to an indefensible 39%. This is not merely a statistic; it represents billions of liters of precious water lost daily due to thousands of unrepaired leaks and a crumbling pipe network.
For the ANC to now threaten water restrictions on residents is to punish the public for the government’s own incompetence. The sentiment expressed by furious residents captures the justified anger towards an administration that is long on threats and short on solutions.
The DA wants to make it clear: the problem is not a lack of water, but a catastrophic failure of management and maintenance. While the ANC threatens restrictions, the real solution lies in launching an aggressive, City-wide leak repair campaign instead of the current approach of trying to save money on operational expenditure to make the City’s finances look good. The residents of Tshwane cannot and should not pay the price for this failure. DA ward councillors have been working for months to get the administration’s attention regarding water leaks, even going to the extent of launching petitions to have leaks fixed. We call on the Mayor to take water leaks seriously and stop blaming residents for her administration’s failures.