The Organisation Undoing Tax Abuse (Outa) has partnered with Water Shortage South Africa (WSSA) to lead the campaign for an Independent National Water Regulator in South Africa.

Yamkela Ntola, Outa’s Water and Environment Portfolio Manager, says the establishment of independent water regulator is long overdue: “This is due to, among other things, the Department of Water and Sanitation’s failure to execute its regulatory function effectively.”

“The myriad of issues in the Department require serious and effective intervention and the establishing of a regulator independent from the Department is a solution that both Outa and WSSA agree on.”

Benoît Le Roy, Chief Executive Officer of the WSSA adds that the presence of an Independent Water Regulator will also unlock much-needed investment in the water sector.

Steering committee

Outa and WSSA have put together a Steering Committee with representatives from each organisation as well as technical and policy specialists.  This committee met on 5 December to outline the objectives and the programme for this collaboration for 2019.

“Details will be made available within the first quarter of next year on how Outa and WSSA will engage with all stakeholders,” says Ntola.

Le Roy explains that over the next two years the steering committee aims to engage all interested and affected stakeholders across the country to gather and consolidate their inputs to present before the appropriate state institutions.

“This will include but will not be limited to the agricultural, mining, manufacturing and the food and beverage industries,” says Le Roy.

Why an independent National Water Regulator in South Africa?

An independent water regulator assist with the following:

• Ensuring the Constitutional right to healthy water,
• Ensuring apolitical management of South Africa’s water allocations to the various sectors, using water strictly within the confines of the Constitution, the Water Act and other legislation and based on scientific data on water availability.
• Ensuring apolitical regulation of pollution of our water resources, with the regulator enforcing compliance by all, be it industry, municipalities, farming or SOEs.
• Overseeing the quality of potable water provided by government-controlled water boards, utilities and cities
• Helping to maintain equitable pricing to all water users in a fair and transparent manner.