SA government knew about (yet ignored) water crisis for years

South Africa’s worsening water crisis has been years in the making, with scientists, analysts and journalists warning for nearly two decades that the country’s supply systems were heading for trouble.

This comes as Water and Sanitation Minister Pemmy Majodina, alongside the Deputy President Paul Mashatile, assesses the scale of the crisis nationwide, with reports suggesting support for a possible disaster declaration in parts of the Western Cape.

Years of warnings went largely ignored

Journalist Philip de Wet says the signs of a looming crisis were already clear in the late 2000s.

He pointed to reporting from that period, warning that demand would soon outstrip supply if authorities failed to act.

“There was this drumbeat of warnings where the scientists and environmentalists and systems analysts all said we are facing a breakdown of the water system,” said De Wet.

He added that infrastructure upgrades and supply planning failed to keep pace with population growth and urban demand.

A 2015 front-page investigation he co-authored warned that ‘South Africa’s great thirst has begun’, but he said the issue struggled to compete for public attention against politics, crime and corruption.

Crisis mirrors early load shedding years

De Wet said the country’s water problems share similarities with the early days of load shedding, where technical warnings were available, but action lagged.

“We had all of the information that we needed, and there wasn’t political will behind it,” he said.

However, he also argued that public pressure plays a role in driving political action.

“If the job of a politician is to respond to popular pressure, then by doing nothing on water, they reflected the will of the people for some reason.”

Public anger may now force action

With outages worsening in major metros and smaller municipalities alike, De Wet believes the scale of disruption is now forcing a response.

“They are finally losing their minds because they have lost water for days or weeks, and they know it’s not getting better,” he said.

But he warned that delays mean solutions will now be more expensive and harder to implement.

“You don’t have time to train up water engineers the way you could have back then. Everything is harder and needs to happen a lot faster.”

Fixes exist, but institutions must deliver

Despite the severity of the situation, De Wet said experts have long outlined both short- and long-term interventions.

These include repairing municipal infrastructure, improving water treatment capacity and tapping into groundwater resources.

“There are many things that you can do immediately to alleviate the pressure, and many things you can do over the long run,” he said.

But he stressed that successful recovery would depend on functioning institutions, technical expertise and investor confidence in how projects are managed.

As the crisis deepens, the real test may be whether the urgency now felt by residents translates into sustained political and financial commitment to rebuild South Africa’s water systems.

For more detailed information, listen to De Wet using the audio player below: