Water Affairs Minister Edna Molewa on Thursday launched the Colesberg wastewater treatment works, in the Northern Cape, a development project aimed at refurbishing the Umsobomvu municipality’s ageing bulk water infrastructure.

She noted that the facility would aid in the eradication of the “bucket system”, which saw 2 928 residents residing on informal stands using buckets rather than an established sanitation system.

“Plans are also in place, through the Northern Cape bucket eradication programme, to address part of the sanitation backlog in Colesberg, through the provision of waterborne sanitation.

“This situation will be enabled by the commissioning of the new Colesberg wastewater treatment works, which is now able to handle the additional hydraulic load that this will create,” Molewa commented.

While acknowledging the need for improved sanitation systems and water infrastructure in the region, she noted that funding remained a primary constraint, citing the municipality’s inability to raise the revenue necessary to address the water service backlog.

“Work has been done to look into the cost estimates for the required work, which indicated that, for this area to be optimally serviced, a funding shortfall of around R155-million exists,” Molewa said.

However, as the water resource management functions of the Umsobomvu municipality were fulfilled by the Department of Water Affairs’ Free State regional office, she stated that Bloem Water, which was responsible for water supply functions in the southern Free State, could potentially play a role in water services provision in the Umsobomvu municipality.

“We might, therefore, wish to engage one another further and see how we can optimise the use of Bloem Water in this regard,” Molewa said.

While adding that she was “quite glad” that the Umsobomvu municipality had provided a basic water supply to 27 318 people, or 96% of the population, she lambasted it for not monitoring and reporting on nonrevenue water and water losses which were “much too high”.

The municipality currently experienced water losses of between 40% and 50% from the reticulation networks in Colesberg, Norvalspont and Noupoort.

“This is a definite call for urgent action towards stopping such losses. It is a legal requirement that a water services authority monitor and report on steps taken to reduce the quantity of water unaccounted for on a monthly basis.

“We need to remind the municipality that it is important to keep a record of the quantities of water measured and the calculations made in respect of water balance analysis and determination of water losses,” Molewa held.