The Auditor-General South Africa’s (AGSA’s) first consolidated water-sector audit report reveals systemic breakdowns across the water value chain, which poses significant risks to public health, environmental sustainability and basic service delivery.

The comprehensive ‘2023/24 Water Sector Report’, published in December, highlights significant issues, including unsafe drinking water systems in 46% of municipalities and chemical safety failures in 44%, as well as near-total failure of wastewater treatment plants, with 99% failing at least one effluent quality standard.

In December, the Portfolio Committee on Water and Sanitation, when receiving a comprehensive briefing from the AGSA, expressed deep concern over the findings, which showed weaknesses in planning, infrastructure delivery, maintenance, compliance and accountability.

According to the report, water service authorities (WSAs) spent only 3% of their asset value on repairs and maintenance, far below the 8% benchmark, resulting in deteriorating infrastructure, polluted water sources and service interruptions.

Water losses amounted to R14.89-billion in the 2023/24 financial year, while reliance on costly water tankers increased. Of the R2.32-billion spent on tankers, R419-million was classified as irregular, the AGSA’s report outlines.

In addition, infrastructure project delivery showed significant delays, ranging between 25 and 64 months, with an average delay of 32 months across all implementing agents.

The AGSA linked the failures to weak project planning, poor procurement practices and limited project management capacity.

The AGSA, during its presentation to the Portfolio Committee on Water and Sanitation, pointed to widespread failures in water services development plans (WSDPs), with many municipalities lacking updated or credible plans to guide water service delivery.

The report found that 26% of WSAs had no WSDPs, while 6% had outdated WSDPs older than five years. Three WSAs could not provide evidence of plans.

About 10% of the WSAs with WSDPs failed to report implementation to the Department of Water and Sanitation (DWS).

The AGSA warned that failure to plan strategically undermined the sustainability of water service delivery and weakened oversight and budgeting processes across municipalities.

During the briefing, the AGSA explained that while the DWS, the Water Trading Entity and the Trans-Caledon Tunnel Authority had achieved unqualified audit opinions, the majority of WSAs continued to perform poorly.

Only 23 of 135 WSAs received clean audits.

Further, material irregularities exceeding R1.7-billion were identified across national and local entities, involving payments for services not received, non-compliance with environmental laws, poor contract management and revenue that was either not billed or recovered.

The AGSA confirmed that recovery processes for financial losses were ongoing, with some cases referred to the Special Investigating Unit; however, legal complexities continued to delay full recovery. The AGSA further stressed the need for accurate billing systems, prioritisation of maintenance budgets and stronger municipal governance.

The briefing further highlighted major delays in establishing Catchment Management Agencies, noting that only two were operational during the audit period, significantly limiting effective water resource management and regulatory oversight.

Portfolio Committee on Water and Sanitation chairperson Leon Basson described these findings as shocking.

The committee called for urgent accountability measures, including intensified oversight visits to provinces and municipalities; regular reporting and joint sessions with water boards; and strengthened reporting requirements from WSAs and the DWS. Further proposals included exploring legal avenues and a possible commission of inquiry into municipal water service failures, as well as considering pursuing criminal charges against municipalities that are polluting rivers and oceans with untreated sewage.

“The state of our water sector is unacceptable. We cannot allow untreated sewage to poison our rivers and communities to suffer without clean water. Accountability must be enforced and decisive action will follow,” Basson concluded.