LETTER: Water crisis due to ANC incompetence

Many ANC ward councillors in the Eastern Cape are nowhere to be found to share information with residents on what exactly is happening in the communities they swore to serve.

In some cases in ANC-controlled municipalities, people are without water for days and even weeks, and the disabled and elderly can’t walk long distances carrying containers to fetch water from tanker trucks — when they come!

Sadly, protest action that often erupts into violence and destruction is the only language that ANC municipalities seem to understand before they resolve these issues. The water crisis in parts of the Eastern Cape is a result of ANC incompetence and its inability to maintain and repair infrastructure. This is now used as a political tool to undermine those in power by opposing factions in the ANC.

This is a man-made crisis, and it has created opportunity for comrades-in-corruption to loot taxpayer funds through deliberate vandalism of infrastructure, which often results in the irregular awarding of water distribution tenders to friends of certain ANC comrades. This is especially prevalent in the six local municipalities that fall under the Amathole district.

It would be of great interest to know who the beneficiaries of the water distribution tenders are and who actually owns the water trucks. At a cost of more than R10,000 per week, how much has been spent over the years for water distribution in this manner?

Thulani Dasa
Khayelitsha

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