Committee Concerned by Sewerage Spillages in Mpumalanga

Parliament� The Portfolio Committee on Water and Sanitation is concerned by the state of Waste Water Treatment Works in Mpumalanga Province’s Gert Sibande District Municipality that has resulted in hazardous spillages in the streams and rivers in the area.

According to the information received by the Committee, there is none of the Waste Water Treatment Works in the district is fully functional. This is despite the growing population and increased demand on the available infrastructure. It is unacceptable that raw sewer finds its way into the rivers, in particular the Vaal River and the dams around the province. At the Standerton WWTW, the malfunction of filters has resulted in untreated water finding its way into the Vaal river system, said Mr Mlungisi Johnson, the Chairperson of the Committee.

The municipality sited the long procurement process as an impediment to dealing with some of the urgent challenges. Furthermore, the rate of implementation of projects is disturbingly slow which must be looked into, Mr Johnson emphasised. The Committee was shocked to learn that a 2 Megalitre plant has not been functional since 2015.

The Committee decried the sluggish intervention by all spheres of government in resolving such an environmental risk factor. It is the Committee’s considered view that a piecemeal approach will not work in resolving the challenges faced by the district. A comprehensive response is necessary to deal with this hazardous challenge.

Furthermore, there is no sign of evidence based planning happening at municipal level. The Committee has encouraged the district municipality to reach out to Statistics South Africa to gather information that it can use for projection into the future.

In Amersfoort the Committee learned that the township community is still using septic tanks which spill over when table water rises, especially during rainy season. It is totally unacceptable that our people are exposed to such raw sewage as part of their daily lives. This robs them of their dignity and must be resolved urgently stressed Mr Johnson.

The Committee urged those in authority for urgency in dealing with WWTW challenge in the district. The Committee has called for collaborative effort between the provincial departments of Human Settlements, Cooperative Governance and Water and Sanitation and the district municipality to unblock some of the identified blockages.

For its part, the Committee has nominated two of its Mpumalanga based Members to assist the multi-sectoral team to come up with workable solutions to the worrying challenges.

The Committee is in Mpumalanga Province on an oversight visit to assess the state of service delivery in relation to water and sanitation in the province.

Source: Parliament of the Republic of South Africa

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