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South Africans have rightly expressed deep concern at the Minister of Water and Environmental Affairs' announcement that only 7% of out of 449 wastewater plants assessed in the country are being "excellently managed" (in fact the figure is probably substantially lower, as only 53% of wastewater plants were able to be assessed, implying, in fact that less than 4% actually fully comply with the requirements). Risk based assessments conducted for each province recommend that in order to address the very serious state of our wastewater plants, the Department of Water Affairs be presented with a corrective plan of action for each municipality. The DA agrees.

To date the Western Cape is one of the few provinces in South Africa that has properly formulated water service development plans for all of its municipalities, and it is the only province that regularly audits and reports on the implementation of these plans. On Wednesday this week, the Western Cape government tabled a comprehensive report on addressing the infrastructure backlogs in the water services sector.

What is clearly needed now is for the rest of the country to follow suit - and for the minister to take the appropriate action to ensure this happens. What is concerning is that, instead of looking to the risk assessments for guidance, Ms. Sonjica has actually done the exact opposite - and tried to sweep them under the carpet. She has now stated that these documents cannot be made available to the general public. The minister is wrong - the citizens whose welfares are being affected by this crisis deserve to know the extent of dysfunctionality, and, most importantly, deserve to know exactly what corrective action needs to be taken to, and is being taken. In fact, each of the province's risk assessments is accessible, in any case, on the Department of Water Affairs' website, and the minister would do well to avoid removing those pages.

The DA believes that action should be taken and we propose that the risk assessment results be verified without delay, in consultation with the relevant municipalities, and that those responsible be held accountable. It was the DA's actions, in leaking the executive summary of the Green Drop report, that precipitated the release of the full report. We will continue to apply that sort of oversight pressure to this department to ensure that we see real action taken to improve the situation in our wastewater plants in South Africa. And where we govern, we will continue to ensure that our municipalities employ comprehensive water service development plans, and regular audits, to radically improve the standards of these plants.