Cape Town Water Director Highlights Urgent Issues at WISA 2026 Conference

The water crisis in South Africa has become one of the most pressing issues facing municipalities today. Across the country, towns and settlements are grappling with rising demand, climate instability, aging infrastructure, and shrinking financial resources. These factors have placed local authorities at the center of a national emergency. However, despite the enormous scale of the difficulties, the crisis presents significant opportunities for collaboration and shared responsibility.

Causes and Scale of the Problem

The crisis is viewed not as a failure of municipalities, but as a symptom of pressure on the entire nation. Experts believe the solution lies in updating the social contract between municipalities, the public, industry, youth, and national partners, which is reflected in the WRC campaign 'A WaterWise Nation.'

South Africa loses 37 percent of treated water due to leaks, pipe bursts, vandalism, and illegal connections. This volume of water was obtained, treated, and pumped at great cost, yet it disappears before reaching consumers. For municipalities, already struggling with budget shortages, such losses are catastrophic.

Infrastructure and Regional Challenges

According to the Department of Water and Sanitation, 105 municipalities face a combined water infrastructure deficit of approximately 400 billion rand. Many treatment plants and pipelines have reached or exceeded their service life, while accelerated urbanization and climate change intensify the strain on fragile systems. Despite investments of nearly 100 billion rand over the past five years, repair and modernization efforts are not keeping pace with growing demand.

Tension is felt across all provinces. In Gauteng, residents of Mogale City, Westber, Ebony Park, Tsakana, and Johannesburg South have experienced prolonged outages due to dwindling reservoirs during periods of intense heat. In the eThekwini region of KwaZulu-Natal, more than fifty districts continue to face instability due to infrastructure failures and power interruptions. In the Eastern Cape, Nelson Mandela Bay is caught in cycles of drought, with reservoir levels frequently dropping below 20 percent.

Free State continues to battle multi-day water supply disruptions in towns such as QwaQwa, Welkom, and parts of Mangaung, often linked to pump failures and aging main pipelines. Limpopo and North West face similar issues, as frequent breakdowns occur in Polokwane, Mahikeng, and Clerksdorp due to the collapse of old networks under pressure.

A New Social Contract for Water Security

Given the circumstances, municipalities must take the lead, but they cannot do so alone. South Africa requires an updated municipal social contract where responsibility is shared, not delegated. Civil society organizations, businesses, and government must act as partners in safeguarding the water future.

Municipal leadership remains a key element. Local governments are responsible for water distribution and treatment, planning infrastructure investments, and initial response to system failures. Their ability to communicate transparently, interact constructively with communities, and collaborate across sectors lays the foundation of trust that is critical for joint action.

Communities also play an increasingly vital role. When residents promptly report leaks, conserve water during peak hours, protect infrastructure from vandalism, and understand municipal limitations, water supply systems become more stable and manageable. Community forums on water issues, volunteer groups, and neighborhood patrols have already demonstrated their effectiveness in supporting municipalities in several regions.

The private sector is also a crucial part of this partnership. Local industries can implement water-efficient processes, invest in on-site reuse systems, and collaborate with municipalities on smart metering and network monitoring. These measures reduce the burden on municipal supply and support economic sustainability.

The A WaterWise Nation Campaign

The WRC campaign 'A WaterWise Nation' provides municipalities, communities, industries, and educators with a unified framework for building a water future. The campaign emphasizes behavioral change as one of the most powerful tools for reducing demand and protecting supply. It offers municipalities informational materials, data, case studies, and tools to mobilize households and businesses. It supports communities with accessible knowledge about responsible water use, encourages industry to adopt efficient and sustainable methods, and provides young people with information and inspiration to become stewards of water resources.

Furthermore, 'A WaterWise Nation' reinforces a fundamental principle: water security is not just a government task. It is a collective responsibility shaped by the daily decisions of millions of South Africans. If every household, business, school, and community adopts even small water-saving habits, the cumulative national effect will be immense.

Call to Action and the Future

South African municipalities are navigating some of the most challenging conditions in democratic history, yet they remain the bedrock of local resilience. Their work deserves recognition, and their challenges require partnership, not criticism. This is a moment for collective responsibility, where residents, businesses, and government unite to protect the systems that sustain us.

The path forward will require honesty, innovation, and collective commitment. But it is a path they are fully capable of taking. If they align their goals, support local leadership, and embed water-saving behavior in society, they can change the trajectory of the crisis and create cities that are both sustainable and future-ready. South Africa's water future will be determined not only by built infrastructure but by the choices made today. Urgent action is needed, in partnership and with the understanding that water security belongs to all of us.

The international conference WISA 2026 will take place at the Cape Town International Convention Centre (CTICC) from July 22 to 24, 2026. The event will bring together delegates from the water sector under the theme 'Rethinking Amanzi – Securing Our Future.'

Context and National Agenda

Against the backdrop of water supply infrastructure, service provision, and long-term water security remaining priorities in South Africa's national agenda, the Water Institute of Southern Africa (WISA) is organizing a three-day conference that will attract over 2000 specialists.

Government Commitment and Investment

The conference follows President Cyril Ramaphosa's launch of several water supply programs and announcements of new commitments in water infrastructure, jointly with Vice President Paul Mashatile. Ramaphosa pledged R156 billion for water supply and sanitation infrastructure over the next three years. He also warned that municipalities and officials who fail to properly manage water services could face legal consequences, as the government intensifies efforts to combat the escalating water crisis in South Africa.

Conference Program and Participants

Ramaphosa noted that these investments are part of a broader strategy aimed at increasing water accessibility in underserved communities and addressing water insecurity. The conference program will begin on Wednesday, July 22, with an opening address by Ian Palmer, Chairman of the WISA Organizing Committee, followed by a presentation from Dr. Lester Goldman, CEO of WISA, and an official opening by Minister of Water and Sanitation Pemmy Majodina.

Deputy Ministers David Makhubo and Dr. Jack Bloom, as well as Dr. Shaun Phillips, CEO of the Department of Water and Sanitation (DWS), will also be present. A keynote speech will be delivered by the President of the Federation of African Engineering Organizations (FAEO), Refilwe Buthelezi (Pr. Eng), who will call on water resource experts to lead the Fourth Industrial Revolution in water use, focusing on rethinking governance, technology, and investment in Africa's water future.

Technical Aspects and Discussions

The technical program includes over 80 sessions across specialized tracks, workshops, and high-level meetings. Topics under discussion cover microplastics, groundwater sustainability and managed aquifer recharge, including the Cape Flats aquifer, as well as climate resilience, droughts, floods, alternative water supply services, and water infrastructure upgrades.

Furthermore, the conference has scheduled a high-level panel discussion on water sector financing, meetings with the Department of Water and Sanitation, consultative sessions related to the UN Water Conference in 2026, and sessions from the Commission for Water Research, focused on South Africa's agenda for water research and innovation.

Expert Views on the Sector's Future

Goldman emphasized that the water sector challenges in South Africa cannot be solved by one organization alone. He stated that as pressure on water resources grows, collaboration between different disciplines and institutions becomes critically important. WISA 2026 provides a valuable opportunity for the sector to exchange experiences, showcase innovations, and find practical ways to improve water security and service delivery. Goldman added that the necessary knowledge, innovation, and commitment to improving South Africa's water future already exist within the sector, and the collective task is to accelerate the implementation of good ideas to achieve tangible results.

Ian Palmer noted that in these complex times, countries are restructuring, and international cooperation organizations are losing legitimacy amid climate instability. There is economic, social, and political uncertainty at the national level, which affects the capacity of key state institutions in the water sector, including local authorities. In Palmer's view, water professionals need to act, and holding meetings to present new ideas and discuss sector challenges is necessary. He concluded that WISA 2026 serves as an important platform for such interactions, being a flagship event for the South African water community and international water resource specialists interested in the region.

The escalating water crisis in South Africa is attributed not so much to a lack of infrastructure, but rather to weak governance, inefficient financial management, and the inability of municipalities to generate revenue.

Focus on the financial aspect

Shirley Robinson, head of DNA Economics' practice on climate and public economics, emphasized that financing municipal water infrastructure is primarily an issue of municipal finance. She shared these thoughts during the webinar 'Beyond Infrastructure: Financing South Africa's Water Future,' which gathered experts to shift the discussion focus from infrastructure deficit to financial capacity.

Distribution of responsibility in the water sector

The webinar was moderated by Dr. Ochiocheoya Omiunu, a research fellow at the British Academy, and participants included the South African Institute of International Affairs (SAIIA), DNA Economics, GreenCape, and the Infrastructure Finance and Implementation Support Agency (IFISA). Robinson explained that discussions about financing always begin with how the necessary investment will be executed, but they must start with an assessment of the municipality's ability to sustain long-term infrastructure investments.

She clarified that the country's water supply system consists of several interconnected components. The national government is responsible for strategic water infrastructure, including dams and main pumping schemes, which are designed and operated by water boards. Municipalities, on the other hand, are responsible for the infrastructure that directly provides water and sanitation services to end consumers.

Systemic nature of the problem

According to Robinson, each part of the water sector has its own institutional duties, risk profiles, and financing. She stated that financing municipal water infrastructure is fundamentally a municipal finance problem, but more deeply, it is a systemic problem. In her words, funding failures rarely occur due to a lack of capital; they arise because the institutional conditions necessary to absorb, manage, and maintain these investments have not been created.

The expert noted that the success or failure of projects depends not on isolated factors, but on the functioning of planning, budgeting, revenue collection, procurement, asset management, and governance systems. When these systems operate effectively, finances can flow; otherwise, a market failure occurs, and even well-designed projects face difficulties attracting funding.

Barriers to securing funds

Robinson added that the main obstacle to financing municipal water infrastructure is not the availability of capital, but the financial health and institutional capacity of the municipality or sponsor to plan, finance, procure, operate, maintain, and upgrade this infrastructure over the next twenty to thirty years.

She also drew attention to the National Treasury's recent decision to temporarily suspend 'Fair Share' transfers for July for 69 municipalities, which serves as a reminder of the direct link between municipal financial management, institutional trust, service delivery, and willingness to invest. This creates a paradox: despite the acute need for significant investment to restore aging assets, reduce water losses, expand services, and increase climate resilience, many municipalities are simultaneously experiencing decline, revenue collection problems, growing debt obligations, weak liquidity, outdated infrastructure, and limited fiscal capacity. Paradoxically, municipalities with the greatest infrastructure needs are often the least able to attract funding.

Expert views on creditworthiness

Robinson stressed that a project's attractiveness for financing is a characteristic of the environment in which the investment takes place, not an inherent characteristic of the financial instrument itself. She noted that building financially sustainable institutions, reliable management systems, and well-prepared projects begins long before a municipality approaches a lender.

Raldo Kruger, a technical specialist at GreenCape for green finance and the water sector, added that any discussion of municipal creditworthiness must begin with an analysis of the current state of investments and highlighting historical underfunding of infrastructure and the huge need to accelerate investment, especially in the context of increasing climate resilience. He reported that municipalities lose about 35% of the water entering the system due to leaks and losses, which in 2019 was equivalent to a loss of about 10 billion rand in revenue for municipalities across the country.

Kruger defined creditworthiness as the confidence of capital providers that their investments are safe and that they will be able to earn a return. He pointed out that key factors depend on management, revenue management, and expenditure management, all three pillars resting on good governance, leadership, and future planning. Without creditworthiness, municipalities will face serious difficulties in stimulating economic growth through infrastructure investment.