By Nomfundo Mbatha and Rod Amner
Around R400-million of taxpayers’ money has been spent since 2015 to increase the amount of water available to us from the James Kleynhans Water Treatment Works (JKWTW) in the east, from 10-12 megalitres a day (ML/day) to 20 ML/day.
Sadly – and outrageously – this won’t happen for at least another two years.
This is despite the fact that JKWTW can now treat 20 ML/day and is connected to an unlimited supply of water from the Fish-Orange River water scheme.
Why aren’t we getting 20 ML/day from the east?
According to retired local engineer Peter Sturrock, the main reason we can’t get 20 ML/day from James Kleynhans is that we need two functioning rising lines to pump that amount of water to the city.
A rising line was installed in 2014, but an older one, which lies parallel to it, needs to be refurbished. In addition, some alterations must be made to the manifold at the pump station to accommodate the second rising line.
All this was supposed to have been included in Phase 2 of the JKWTW project. But it wasn’t. Instead, it was deferred to Phase 3, which was supposed to have been finished in June this year.
But Amatola Water last week told Grocott’s Mail that the Phase 3 tender that went out last year had to be cancelled as no suitable contractor could be found. While the tender will be reopened later this year, Phase 3 will take at least 18 months to complete, which means, if all goes according to the new plan, we can only get 20 ML/day in late 2027.
Where are the pumps?
The other major problem is that there are only two working pumps at the JKWTW.
We need four working pumps (and, ideally, two spares) to pump 20 ML/day. When Amatola Water handed over the JKWTW to Makana Municipality in 2024, there were four pumps at the treatment works – three working pumps and, according to local resident Rob Bowles, who posted on social media, a fourth pump was present at the time, still boxed and unused.
Sturrock said one of the three pumps handed over last year was damaged when Makana inadvisedly attempted to pump 16 ML/day through the one working rising line.
But where is this broken pump?
According to Public Service Accountability Monitor (PSAM) director Jay Kruuse, when the Co-operative Governance and Traditional Affairs (Cogta) Deputy Minister, Namane Dickson Masimola and Eastern Cape MEC Zolile Williams visited Makhanda four weeks ago, Makana Municipality explained that they still owed a Joburg-based company around R150 000 for unpaid services rendered and that this was delaying the repair of a backup pump.
The officials warned that if the pumps failed, it would result in severe water outages. They confirmed that the facility should have four pumps and an additional two on standby.
Masimola and Williams directed the Makana Municipality to engage with their Department and Treasury with a view to securing R10 million in funds to ensure adequate availability of pumps and regular supply of water to residents.
It is unknown whether this directive was heeded.
Meanwhile, no one can tell us where the fourth unboxed spare pump handed over to Makana by Amatola Water last year went.
Where are the Cogta ministers?
When the Cogta ministers visited Makhanda on Wednesday, 14 May, they vowed to assemble a high-powered, inter-departmental team of engineers and financial experts to take over responsibility for the management of Makana’s infrastructure programmes. “They will take full charge of the management and the running of this [Makana] Municipality,” Masemola said.
Meanwhile, Cogta spokesperson Pheelo Oliphant said in that week that Masemola would return
to the city in two weeks. Oliphant said Masemola was assembling highly-qualified engineers from the Municipal Infrastructure Support Agency (MISA) and the water and sanitation department, as well as financial and supply chain experts from the provincial treasury and Cogta, for deployment at the Makana Municipality.
It has been a month, and there is no sign of them.
PAIA applications
A while back, the Makhanda Residents Association (MRA) put in two Promotion of Access to Information (PAIA) requests; one for James Klynhans and the other for Howiesonspoort, to determine where each pump was, Machanick said. After ignoring the PAIA requests and being ordered to comply by the High Court, it transpired that the municipality could not account for all the pumps (five at JKWTW and three at Howiesonspoort).
In other words, Makana was incapable of keeping records on the acquisition, management or whereabouts of their pumps. Each pump costs between R3 and R4 million.
R2.9 million for a pump that never appeared
They could, however, account for the non-appearance of one of the pumps. In June 2023, the Makana Municipality suspended its Director of Engineering and Infrastructural Services, Asanda Gidana, after R2.964 million was paid for a water pump for the Howieson’s Poort Dam pump station that was never delivered.
Gidana prepaid Manco Business Enterprises for the pump in 2022 without proper due diligence. The total bill for the pump was R4.906 million, with R2.694 million as the prepayment. This new pump for the Howieson’s Poort Dam pump station should have been delivered and installed in February 2023, but never was. Prepayment of goods and services before they are delivered is prohibited by the Municipal Finance Management Act (MFMA).
Grocott’s Mail this week asked Makana Municipality if Manco had ever paid back the R2.9 million. Makana did not respond in time for publication.
The pumps that drowned in negligence
Meanwhile, some of the James Kleynhans pumps were ruined in 2023 when they were submerged in water due to negligence at the plant.
According to DA Ward 4 councillor Geoff Embling, there were several suggestions for the cause. The first one is that the non-return valves on the pipes leading out of the pump station were faulty. This would have caused water, which had been pumped up to Botha’s Hill, to flow back down the line and flood the pump station, Embling said at the time.
The second is that the valve on the holding reservoir for treated water entering the pump station could not be shut, which would have caused the flooding. Either way, management would have been responsible for any lack of maintenance, and the officials on duty at the pump station would have been accountable for negligence and absence from duty.
A history of chronic delay
The JKWTW upgrade began in earnest in 2015. Last year, Amatola Water, which was overseeing the (chronically delayed) project, finished Phase 2 of the project and handed over the refurbished plant to the Makana Municipality.
That should have been cause for unbridled jubilation in our city. Finally, we would have access to enough water to cover our water needs, because in tandem with the 8 ML/day that is pumped from the Howiesonspoort Water Treatment Works on the western side, Kleynhans’ 20 ML/day would give us a combined 28 ML/day.
In 2019, it was estimated that the city needed 18 ML/day to keep the taps running day and night. However, much of our water (as much as 30% by some estimates) is wasted, and our population has gone up since then. Sturrock suggests that we may need as much as 27 ML/day to cope with current demand and keep water flowing 24/7 in our taps.
After 10 years of chronic delays and almost half a billion rands of expenditure, we still don’t have the promised 28 ML/day.
A constant supply of water would be much gentler on our creaking water infrastructure. The continuous on-off water shedding schedule places undue pressure on our fragile water system.
Last week, Amatola Water spokesperson Nolitha Mbangcolo told Grocott’s Mail that, under normal circumstances, with functioning infrastructure, Makhanda could expect 20 ML/day from JKWTC. “We expect that, under normal operating conditions, the James Kleynhans Water Treatment Works should be able to produce and distribute the full capacity of 20 ML/day to Makhanda East,” she said.
It turns out that this is simply untrue.
Even with the ability to treat 20 ML/day at JKWTW and with three pumps at Howiesonspoort and six at Kleynhans, we will have to wait until 2027 or 2028 for a full, 24/7 water supply. This is despite the fact that our connection to the Fish-Orange system should make Makhanda one of the most secure water cities in the country.
Phase 3
Phase 3 will encompass the refurbishment of existing components of the JKWTW, including the refurbishment of the second rising line. Contractors will also excavate a drainage channel out of the pump station, which is relatively deep underground. This is to protect the pump station from flooding – if a non-returnable valve fails, water pumped upstream can fill the jumpstation far faster than the small pump available for draining can keep up.
It is unclear how much Phase 3 will add to the R400 million bill already racked up for the project.
