Residents ‘angry and exhausted’ as Joburg’s water outages drag on

Persistent water outagesacross Johannesburg reflect a “fragile, poorly maintained system” that is failing residents, water advocacy groupWaterCANhas warned. On Tuesday, frustrated residents in Midrandembarked on a peaceful protestas large parts of the city continued to experience prolonged and recurring water disruptions. In Laudium, aggrieved residentsprotested dry taps.

WaterCAN saidsome Johannesburg communities have been without reliable waterfor weeks — and in some cases months — a situation worsened by poor communication from the responsible authorities. “WaterCAN has found that communities inMelvilleand Meldene have endured approximately 14 days without water, while residents in Selby have experienced intermittent or no supply for close to five months … Midrand has been plunged into a new outage linked to bulk supply constraints,” the organisation said. These were not isolated incidents, said WaterCAN executive directorFerrial Adam.

“They reflect a fragile, poorly maintained system that cannot cope when failures occur and paint a picture of a city-wide problem.” Adam acknowledged that the current crisis was triggered by an explosion at a pump station and a major leak at aRand Waterreservoir and thatJohannesburg Waterwas operating within an overstretched and deteriorating reticulation system. “However, infrastructure failure does not excuse silence, institutional indifference or the abdication of public accountability,” she said. She added that while Rand Water may be contractually accountable to municipalities and the national minister of water and sanitation, this should not absolve it of communicating directly with the public and civil society during prolonged disruptions.

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“Civil society and residents are not peripheral stakeholders. They are the end users who bear the full social, economic and health costs of these decisions. Excluding them from direct communication is unacceptable,” Adam said.

WaterCAN has called on the minister to encourage Rand Water to engage directly with the public during extended outages and on Johannesburg mayorDada Moreroto ensure the city’s utility does the same. The organisation is also calling for senior management at both Rand Water and Johannesburg Water to institute daily, time-bound public briefings accessible online. These briefings, it said, should provide clear and consistent updates on outages and recovery timelines, explain technical issues in accessible language, allow limited questions to address misinformation and serve as a single authoritative source of information for residents.

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