R650m penalty for raw sewage spills

Emalahleni ordered to fund repairs to rivers feeding the Olifants River system

- Sheree Bega

A landmark ruling by the Mpumalanga High Court, which slapped the Emalahleni local municipality with a hefty R650 million fine for allowing raw sewage to flow into rivers and dams for years, has been hailed as a long-overdue step toward accountability.

The judgment must mark the start of a nationwide crackdown on municipal polluters and the officials who enable them, experts said.

The judgment is a watershed moment and a sobering indictment of municipal collapse, said Anja du Plessis, an associate professor at Unisa and specialist in water resource management.

“It is unfortunate that we needed to get to this point of criminalising these actions,” she said. “But the ruling is welcomed and this case once again exposes and emphasises the core issues affecting most wastewater treatment works in the country.”

For Du Plessis, the judgment reinforces what has long been known. “This ruling also supports what we have been saying for decades — there is an ongoing crisis in municipal wastewater management and overall pollution. You do not have to travel far to find such an example.”

The ruling supports better maintenance and financial management, the need for better oversight, and for skilled, experienced operators, as well as compliance across all departments that contributed to the mess. “Accountability is overdue. This should be one action of many.”

The case followed investigations by the Green Scorpions and the Blue Scorpions into community complaints about persistent sewage spills from municipal manholes into tributaries of the Olifants River. Between March 2019 and March 2025, Emalahleni repeatedly allowed untreated sewage to overflow, contaminating the Witbank Dam, the Naawpoort River, Steenkoolspruit, the Klein Olifants, and ultimately the Olifants River.