Minister of human settlements, water and sanitation Lindiwe Sisulu has weighed in on the claims that former minister Nomvula Mokonyane left the department in shambles. 

Sisulu said the problems relating specifically to infrastructure date back to the apartheid government.

In an interview on 702, she said SA did not invest enough in infrastructure for what is now a basic right, adding that the infrastructure inherited in 1994 that was meant to cater for 13% of the population now has to cater for 100%.

Here are five key quotes from the interview:

Ageing infrastructure

"Not only does the department not have enough money, but our infrastructure is ageing and it was never meant to cater for the people it is catering for right now."

Bad reputation

"We do have a very bad reputation in the public domain about how we've been using our money. We can't go to our people and say 'we don't have money'. We have problems of infrastructure that we're dealing with."

Failures of leadership

"There have been failures of leadership under the current government, but playing the blame game is pointless. We need to concentrate on solutions that will give South Africans the dignity they deserve."

Solution

"We service our people at the municipal level through the municipalities and unfortunately their state is not such that they would have the efficiency that we would require or the people would require. We're working with Cogta (department of cooperative governance and traditional affairs) around how to make sure our municipalities have the efficiencies that we need."

Inspections unit

"What we have done is to establish in the department, a construction and an engineering unit that will be able to assist municipalities to deal with any problems that they encounter ... We have just put in place an inspections unit that will from August 1 go and check what the problems are."