“It is just another white elephant,” several Khutsong residents have recently commented when mentioning the Khutsong reservoir.
This facility was built about a kilometre from the old Khutsong reservoir, which had to be decommissioned around 2015 after several sinkholes developed under it.
Although the Gauteng Department of Water and Sanitation made R70 million available to build a new reservoir in 2016, the project ran into numerous problems, causing escalating costs.
Initially, the site, situated between Extension 3 and Rest in Peace, had to be moved after the contractor realised the site was right on top of the main Eskom line to Khutsong. The project then stalled several times due to labour issues and sinkholes. Although the new reservoir was eventually completed at the beginning of 2022, it has still not been filled. It is constantly guarded because the area is frequented by zama-zamas.
The illegal miners have, according to residents, killed guards at the facility and the nearby Eskom substation in the past to get to metal and electrical cables.
The Herald asked the Merafong City Local Municipality when the facility would be utilised last week.
“The reservoir is not yet commissioned. We are waiting for Eskom to instal the mini sub-station and overhead connections. They have further applied for the servitude over the area where the connection line will run,” the municipal spokesperson says.