Municipalities struggling to manage water revenue

WATER and Sanitation Minister Pemmy Majodina painted a sad state of affairs in the local government sphere regarding the provision of water, saying many municipalities were unable to collect revenue.

- MAYIBONGWE MAQHINA

Majodina noted with concern yesterday that when municipalities indeed collected the revenue, they used it for something else.

Majodina made the comment when her department appeared before the Standing Committee on Public Accounts (Scopa).

“In the past, when we started with local government, we had about 84.6% of engineers at a local government level, but as I speak now, we are sitting at about 6.4 engineers.

“The positions are filled, but filled with the wrong people.”

She observed that every time there was no water in a village or township, people blamed her department, which was responsible for building water resources such as dams, canals, or water treatment plants.

“We regulate, but when it comes to reticulation of water and the provision of water is a different mandate altogether, that is in the local government.”

Majodina said there was no crisis when it came to the provision of bulk water supply.