DA wants Ugu to be declared disaster area following water outage for four months
17 June 2021
The Democratic Alliance in the Ugu District Municipality has written to KwaZulu-Natal Premier, Sihle Zikalala, and KZN Cooperative Governance and Traditional Affairs MEC, Sipho Hlomuka, to request them to declare the district a disaster area in terms of Section 55 of the Disaster Management Act.
The Ugu water crisis is now entering its sixth year and shows no signs of abating. Currently, areas around Ramsgate, Margate, Hibberdene and Izingolweni remain without water approaching 17 weeks. Water tankers have not been delivering water to households or refilling community static tanks as filling points have run dry.
The latest water outages are due to lack of vital maintenance, replacement parts, generators at vital water treatment plants and broken pumps. Ongoing problems related to water service delivery have created havoc in this district. Acts of sabotage, intimidation, political infighting and infrastructure vandalism have resulted in this municipality being unable to provide water services to its almost 1 million residents for many years.
The Bill of Rights in the Constitution notes in Section 27(1) that everyone has the right to water.