Auditor-General Sounds Alarm on South Africa’s

South Africa’s water woes are reaching a breaking point, with the Auditor-General revealing that 59 municipalities splashed out a massive R2.32 billion on emergency water tankers in the 2023-2024 financial year. This huge spend comes as crumbling infrastructure, poor planning, and weak maintenance leave millions without reliable taps. Jolene Pillay, a senior manager at the Auditor-General South Africa (AGSA), laid bare these shocking facts to Parliament’s Portfolio Committee on Water and Sanitation on 3 December 2025. She warned that without quick fixes, the whole system could collapse, hitting communities hard with health risks and unreliable supplies. The report shines a light on deep-rooted problems like delayed projects, massive water leaks, and dodgy spending, calling for urgent reforms to save the sector.
This isn’t just about money down the drain—it’s a sign of bigger troubles in how municipalities handle water. With only a handful getting clean audits, most are failing to meet basic standards, leading to unsafe drinking water and polluted rivers. Lawmakers like MP Visvin Reddy called the findings “disgraceful” and demanded action to hold officials accountable, as lives hang in the balance.
Shocking Audit Results Expose Widespread Failures
The AGSA’s deep dive into the water sector uncovered a mess of non-compliance and poor performance. Out of 135 water service authorities checked, just 23 earned clean audits with no red flags on rules or results. That leaves over 100 municipalities struggling, with issues in following laws or delivering services. “We are far from an ideal situation,” Pillay told the committee, stressing how these flops mean unreliable water for everyday people.
A big headache is the lack of proper planning. The Water Services Act says every municipality must have a Water Service Development Plan (WSDP) to map out infrastructure and services. But 25 spots had none at all, and six hadn’t updated theirs in over five years. Even among the 63 with fresh plans, six didn’t bother reporting on how they put them into action for the 2021-2022 and 2022-2023 years. “When municipalities do not prepare or update their water service development plans, there is no structured approach to enable proper functioning and this increases the risk of not fulfilling their service delivery obligations to residents,” Pillay explained.
Regions like the Northern Cape, Free State, Limpopo, North West, and Mpumalanga are hit hardest. In the Northern Cape alone, nine water service authorities had no maintenance plans for wastewater infrastructure. Free State and Northern Cape municipalities often couldn’t show evidence of any plans or updates, while skills for fixing things like water meters were rated poor at 74 authorities. This gap in know-how means leaks and breaks go unfixed, piling on the problems.
Massive Delays in Water Projects Stall Progress
Building and fixing water systems is moving at a snail’s pace, making shortages worse. The report flagged 32 projects lagging by an average of 32 months— that’s over two and a half years behind schedule. Some national schemes are delayed by up to 62 months, water boards by 64 months, and local authorities by 25 months. These hold-ups ripple through the whole chain, from planning to getting water to homes.
Poor coordination between national, provincial, and local players is a key culprit, along with weak monitoring from the Department of Water and Sanitation (DWS) and local government leaders. “There is poor coordination amongst the water sector roleplayers and a lack of monitoring and enforcement of consequences by the DWS and the members of the executive council for local government,” Pillay said. Without these basics, communities stay stuck with patchy supplies, forcing reliance on expensive stopgaps.
Billions Lost to Leaks and Irregular Tanker Spending
Water is vanishing into thin air—or rather, through cracks and leaks—with total losses hitting R14.89 billion last year. That’s a huge chunk, and 74 municipalities blew past the 30% loss limit set by national rules. In Sol Plaatje Local Municipality in the Northern Cape, losses reached a whopping 66%, thanks to no WSDP or maintenance plans. They couldn’t even check their pipes’ condition, ending up forking out R1.6 million on tankers.
Across the board, 59 municipalities turned to tankers to plug the gaps, spending R2.32 billion in total. But here’s the kicker: R419 million of that was irregular—spent without following proper rules. “This reliance on tankering is symptomatic of deeper issues in water infrastructure management,” Pillay noted. Over 20% of the country’s 257 municipalities dipped into this costly fix, with more than R420 million flagged as dodgy in some counts.
Maintenance is another sore spot. Water authorities spent just 3% of their assets’ value on repairs, way below the 8% benchmark. The DWS only hit 39% of its planned fixes. Leak responses are shoddy at 83 authorities, and 60 out of 64 main ones didn’t submit action plans. Plus, 24 authorities skipped no-drop reports on water use, and 46 critical ones gave no details on water balances. All this adds up to wasteful spending and unreliable water.
Wastewater Woes Threaten Health and Environment
The crisis isn’t just about clean water coming in—it’s also about dirty water going out. The DWS’s Green Drop Reports show 90% of wastewater treatment plants failed at least one quality standard. “This has a significant impact on the environment and the water sources in the disposal process,” Pillay warned. Untreated sewage is dumped into rivers and dams, harming ecosystems, spreading diseases, and tainting drinking water.
Drinking water isn’t safe either: 46% of systems are unsafe, and 44% failed chemical checks. A staggering 99% of water treatment plants are failing overall. Staff shortages make it worse—the DWS spotted a gap of 400 workers at treatment works, either vacant posts or unqualified people. At wastewater sites, 60% lack proper technical skills. “We noted that due to the impact that a lack of maintenance has on the reliability of supply, a lot of the water service authorities are using water tankers to provide this essential service,” Pillay added.
In places like eThekwini, losses run into billions, showing how big cities aren’t immune. Northern Cape’s infrastructure flops are a major driver of the tanker surge, while Free State towns see rivers turn into sewers from neglect.
Material Irregularities and Recovery Efforts Underway
The AGSA didn’t just point fingers—they acted. Six material irregularities at the DWS tallied R433 million in losses, with R46.9 million now in recovery. Two caused real harm to the public. At Sol Plaatje, the AG issued a notice to the accounting officer, who started fixes like repairing wastewater plants to cut environmental damage.
But broader issues like “non-compliance with environmental law” persist, with no maintenance plans at 13 authorities checked. This steady slide in wastewater handling spells trouble for health and nature.
Urgent Calls for Reform and Accountability
The report doesn’t stop at bad news—it lays out fixes. Pillay urged mayors and councils to own up, craft solid WSDPs, and invest in maintenance. Hold managers accountable for delivery flops. The Minister of Water and Sanitation should get catchment management agencies fully running to handle resources better. Set up strong monitoring for conservation and projects.
“We need to ensure that there is clear accountability for water conservation efforts, as well as effective monitoring of water infrastructure projects,” Pillay said. Boost oversight of plans and fixes, improve teamwork between levels of government, and build skills in municipalities.
Lawmakers are fired up. MP Visvin Reddy slammed the stats: “What the report revealed is quite shocking to say the least. 46% of available drinking water systems are unsafe. Then we are told 44% failed chemical safety, that means the water out of the taps may poison you.” He added, “We are also told by the AG that 99% of water treatment plants are failing in this country. R14.9bn is lost every year to leaks and municipalities are spending over R2bn on water tankers. Infrastructure projects are delayed on average by 32 months. This is disgraceful. I believe after hearing this we cannot just leave here. This requires a focused campaign to take each of these items and hold officials and water boards accountable because the lives of our people are at stake here.”
The committee must now grill accounting officers for poor showings and push for better wastewater handling. “The root causes of these problems, poor coordination, weak accountability, and a lack of institutional capacity, must be tackled if we are to achieve meaningful improvements in water service delivery,” Pillay stressed.

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