Parts of Joburg have been without water since Sunday after a massive outage. Picture: Timothy Bernard African News Agency (ANA)
Johannesburg Water says there is progress on systems that were affected by the City Power outage at Rand Water’s Eikenhof pump station.
This is after taps in most of the suburbs and township in Johannesburg were left dry, with no water running out of taps since about Sunday in some areas.
In a statement, the water utility said despite the marginal progress at the pump station, complete recovery was projected to take a week at most.
It said developments were seen in areas like Soweto, Brixton, Crosby and Hursthill, including some parts of Roodepoort.
In Soweto, the Chiawelo reservoir, Doornkop West, Power Park, Jabulani, Diepkloof, Orlando East and Meadowlands reservoirs, have improved, but poor pressure may still be expected in the supply zone.
Randburg and other parts of Roodepoort were still critically low.
“Poor pressure to no water may still be expected in the supply zone. Recovery is slow due high demand and reduced incoming flows as the system is still recovering,” it said.
Although there is progress, many areas are still without water and it has been dragging for almost a week.
Frustrated and angry Johannesburg residents have called on the utility to address the matter.
Nhlanhla Vilakazi from Roodepoort told IOL that it was frustrating and straining for her not to have water for days because she has school going children who need water for many reasons.
“What kind of a human being goes for days without water. These water tanks are not helping us because we still join long queues and it is not convenient enough.
“They must just sort out this thing because it’s not fair for us,” she said.
Build One South Africa’s (BOSA) Ayanda Allie also voiced her concerns over the water situation.
“On Tuesday, we woke up with no water running through our tabs, on Wednesday night, we went to bed with no water and today on Thursday, we woke up to no water and electricity,” she said.
Allie said these were desperate times, indicating that they were war against incompetent, corrupt and negligent government.
She stated that all the factors were man-made and that should come to an end.
kamogelo.moichela@inl.co.za
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