South Africa’s Constitution clearly defines the powers and limits of national, provincial and local government. Yet as municipal water and sanitation services decline, questions persist about accountability. The Department of Water and Sanitation outlines why national government cannot simply ‘take over’ struggling municipalities, and why interventions often fail.

Section 40 of the Constitution states: “In the Republic, government is constituted as national, provincial and local spheres of government which are distinctive, interdependent and interrelated.” The keyword is “spheres” – it does not say that there are three layers of government, with national government above local government.

Section 156 of the Constitution states that local government has executive authority in respect of, and has the right to administer, the local government matters listed in Part B of Schedule 4, one of which is water and sanitation services. Functions listed in Part B of Schedule 4 are considered inherent local government functions, or “original powers” of municipalities.

In the late 1990s, in terms of the Municipal Structures Act, the then minister of provincial and local government appointed 144 out of the 257 municipalities in South Africa as Water Services Authorities (WSAs). In some areas of the country, the district municipality is the WSA, and the local municipalities under the district municipality do not have a role to play in the provision of water services.

Water Services Act

S155(7) of the Constitution states that the national government has the legislative and executive authority to see to the effective performance by municipalities of their functions in respect of matters listed in Schedule 4 by regulating the exercise by municipalities of their executive authority. This means the national government can provide a legal framework for the exercising of this executive authority by the local government – and the Water Services Act was enacted in 1997 to provide this framework for municipal water services.

S155 of the Constitution and the Water Services Act enable the DWS to issue regulations related to the provision of water services by WSAs. The DWS issues national norms and standards for municipal water services in terms of the legislation but currently does not have enforcement powers for the norms and standards. The Water Services Amendment Bill that is currently before Parliament provides for the DWS to be given additional regulatory powers to direct WSAs to comply with the norms and standards, and for noncompliance with key aspects of the norms and standards to be a criminal offence, similarly to the National Water Act.

However, there are also limitations to the degree to which regulatory action can address poor performance – for example, the fact that the DWS currently has criminal charges under the National Water Act against 56 of the 144 WSAs for sewage pollution has not resulted in a significant improvement in wastewater management by municipalities.

If “holding municipalities accountable” means making information publicly available regarding their performance, the DWS is doing this through its Blue, Green and No Drop regulatory assessment reports, which have provided evidence of the general decline in municipal performance with regard to water and sanitation services.

However, the Drop reports have not resulted in an improvement in performance. For example, the January 2024 Water Services Summit and the March 2025 Water and Sanitation Indaba, in which Water Services Authorities participated, took resolutions that all WSAs will produce corrective action plans to address their 2022 and 2023 Blue, Green and No Drop report results. However, by September 2025, 53 WSAs had not yet produced corrective action plans. These 53 are among the 105 worst performing WSAs that obtained Blue, Green or No Drop scores which indicated that their water and sanitation systems were in a poor or critical state of performance.

S154 of the Constitution provides for the national and provincial government to support municipalities. The national government is providing considerable support to municipalities for water and sanitation services, including technical and engineering advice and assistance, capacity building and training, financial management advice and support, and grants in excess of R60-billion per annum.

However, despite all the support being provided by the national and provincial governments to municipalities, municipal water and sanitation services continue to decline. This is because there are limitations to which national and provincial support can turn around the decline. For example, in those cases where the leadership of the municipality is not responding to directives or not taking advice, performance can only be improved by addressing the leadership challenges.

In addition, S139 of the Constitution and S63 of the Water Services Act provide for the national government to intervene in local government when a municipality is not fulfilling its water and sanitation services obligations. However, S139 and S63 interventions have generally not been effective in addressing service failures.

This is partly because these interventions are limited in duration (S139 interventions usually involve the appointment of an administrator for six months) and the situation usually deteriorates again after the intervention. The Constitution does not provide for permanent intervention (a “takeover”) of the municipal water and sanitation function, because water services are original municipal functions in terms of Part B of Schedule 4 of the Constitution.

S151(3) of the Constitution states that a municipality has the right to govern, on its own initiative, the local government affairs of its community, subject to the national and provincial legislation. Therefore, S139 interventions cannot include permanently removing the executive authority of local government in respect of the water services function.

Only the electorate can fire a mayor

If “holding municipalities accountable” for poor water and sanitation services includes implementing consequence management measures, such as removing a mayor, or removing the member of the mayoral committee responsible for water and sanitation or taking disciplinary action against water and sanitation officials in the municipality, then this cannot be done by the national government.

Disciplinary action against water and sanitation officials in a municipality can only be implemented by the municipality itself. In addition, neither the President nor any minister in the national government can fire a mayor. There are separate local government elections which result in the election of the political leaders of local government, and the only people with the authority to remove that leadership are the local electorate.

Expert insights by Dr Sean Philips, director general and Wisane Mivasa, spokesperson of the Department of Water and Sanitation