IT HAS emerged that various kasis have been experiencing water supply issues because their treatment plant is 37 years old.
The Human Rights Commission learned this during a visit to the plant in Zithobeni, Tshwane, which also supplies Rethabiseng and Ekangala, on Wednesday, 13 October.
The visit came after the City of Tshwane announced the plant would be temporarily shut down, leaving residents dependent on water tankers.
Buang Jones of the commission said several complaints were made about the standard and supply of water. He said residents sometimes had dirty water and the water was sometimes shut off without warning.
“This has been a growing concern for residents for quite some time and we needed to come and see what was happening here,” he said.
Jones said the commission visited the plant to find out what the problem was and to assure the community that the municipality was trying to fix it. “We also want to monitor the work being done on the ground in resolving this issue,” he said.
Jones said the municipality had many challenges with the state of infrastructure and rivers not being up to standard.
“The facility has reached its lifespan. We hear that the city has begun a process to build a new facility. We will monitor this and make sure this is done as soon as possible,” he said.
City of Tshwane official David Ntsowe told the commission the water plant was built in 1984 and that the lifespan of a water treatment plant was 25 years.
“The City of Tshwane is in the process of fixing it and maybe building a new facility,” he said.