Residents fight illegal water disconnections blitz

As the state this week committed to carry out raids to disconnect illegal water connections to address Joburg water supply challenges, yesterday Joburg Water could only disconnect 2% of Phumlamqashi informal settlement in Lenasia as residents fought back. 

Angry residents in the south of Joburg pelted police and Joburg Water officials with stones and blocked them from leaving the area after having disconnected four illegally connected points. The police had to use rubber bullets to disperse them. 

The group went on to barricade the Golden Highway with rocks and other debris. 

According to residents, for six years they had been illegally connecting pipes to underground water network that supplies water to Lenasia. Phumlamqashi has been in existence for eight years and never had running water as it had not been zoned by the municipality. It was initially provided water through Jojo tanks but these have since been vandalised. 

On Tuesday, residents disrupted the city's operation to get rid of illegal water connections. Joburg Water, metro police and later the SAPS joined in after the protesters barricaded the Golden Highway for more than two hours. They vowed to continue protesting until water is restored.

Resident Ncumisa Mafilivana, 46, a mother of two, said the community was angry and would come back after the police have dispersed to block the highway again. “As long as we don’t have water, we’re going to stay here on the road, night and day,” she said.

“The police are going to go, we are going to come back later and intensify the protest. We’re not the only informal settlement here, we are going to mobilise others because we know they’re going to do the same thing to them.”

Another resident, Zodwa Madela, 46, who runs a day care centre, said she did not know how she was going to manage without water. “I have 36 children [at the centre]; we highly depend on water to make the place clean and bath the children.

“I don’t know what I’m going to do because I can’t afford to buy water. We rely on social grants. We know we connected water illegally but it hurts that they just disconnect without even telling us," she said.

Joburg Water regional manager Kagiso Manganye said the city was losing 48% of water to leaks and illegal connections. “We get about 1,500 megalitres of water per day from Rand Water, and 48% of that we lose to non-revenue water, meaning leaks and illegal connections. The area we went to disconnect [Phumlamqashi] is one of the major contributors in terms of losses,” he said.

“This informal settlement has 13,000 households, but it grows everyday, and the number could be higher. We were able to disconnect four connection points, we unfortunately can't disconnect the major line as it suppliers the area of Lenasia with paying customers.”

Manganye said according to their investigations, there were six informal settlements that have illegally connected to the Lenasia system. “The system was not designed to cater for all those places, that’s why we find ourselves here," he said.

He said the operation was meant to be done over two days but because of safety concerns, they had to abandon their plans. He said he would meet with his bosses and discuss how they would beef up security in order to finish the operation.

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