JOHANNESBURG - The South African Human Rights Commission will investigate Gauteng’s worsening water crisis.
A public inquiry is set to take place in Johannesburg on Tuesday and Wednesday next week.
On Friday, Water and Sanitation Minister Pemmy Majodina told Parliament that although many households have access to taps, water interruptions and unsafe drinking water remain a problem across the country.
A common sight in Johannesburg recently is residents taking to the streets in frustration over ongoing water outages.
The South African Human Rights Commission in Gauteng says it has seen a growing number of complaints relating to prolonged water outages and poor water quality.
SA Human Rights Commission's Khululiwe Sithole said all Gauteng municipalities have been instructed to submit written responses to the commission.
“Section 27 of the Constitution provides everyone with the right to access to water. But when people are opening their taps, and there’s no water that is coming out, or the quality of the water that is coming out is not fit for human consumption.
"It’s more than just a violation of the right to water; it’s a violation of the right to dignity, a violation of the right to even life and the right to health. So you can’t look at the issue of water crisis in isolation, because water, it affects all the other rights.”
“And as part of the notice, we’ve also issued subpoenas to ensure that municipal managers who are accounting officers for municipalities are present in the enquiries to add and give oral submissions to the issue."
Water and Sanitation Minister Pemmy Majodina said the reliability of municipal water services has declined sharply.
"The reliability of municipal water services has declined sharply, with worsening water service disruptions, sewage spillages, and poor water quality in many areas. In other words, while most people now have access to a tap, water often does not come out of the tap or is not safe to drink. This remains an undeniable truth which we are attending to.”
The Human Rights Commission said despite the recent Constitutional Court ruling that its findings are not binding, it still has legal avenues available to enforce accountability.
“If those recommendations are not followed by relevant stakeholders, then the commission has within its right in terms of the act, then to approach the courts to ensure that the recommendations find some legal basis.
"What the court said in the recent matter is, it’s particularly that work of the SA Human Rights Commission that is important because it's work that the court can’t do itself, and it serves as an evidentiary basis for the case when we go to court.”
The inquiry comes amid continued concerns over deteriorating water infrastructure, despite municipalities receiving billions of rand annually for water projects.
Government said that for the current financial year, R12billion in conditional grants have already been allocated.