By Craig Kotze

VAAL TRIANGLE. – “Government should declare a Disaster Area immediately and without delay to turn the corner on the Vaal River sewage pollution crisis which has been allowed to go on for far too long,” said Golden Triangle Chamber of Commerce (GTCoC) spokesperson Rosemary Cloete-Anderson.
Cloete-Anderson made the call after Water and Sanitation Minister Lindiwe Sisulu this week visited the Vaal area to assess progress on the intervention project and it emerged that community resistance and sabotage was increasing rapidly.
The GTCoC and civil society did not believe that the R750 million that Water and Sanitation officials said would be available to fund the project from April was nearly enough, especially since budgets of up to R5billion promised by Government a decade ago had not materialised.
Senior Water and Sanitation officials said community resistance to the Vaal River Intervention Project was increasing and had already resulted in losses of up to R79 million in impacts such as work stoppages whilst contractors still needed to be paid.
This highlighted the need for far more intensive and targeted communication at all levels to change knowledge levels and attitudes of all communities not only on present sewage pollution efforts, but on civic mindfulness on all local government issues, including water and sanitation, Cloete-Anderson added.
Sisulu immediately took a tight grip on the entire intervention in a stakeholder meeting in Vereeniging on Tuesday, dramatically shortening intervention project timelines and insisting that work be scaled up and intensified immediately.
This followed an announcement in that meeting by Sisulu that she was in fact already in consultation with her Cabinet colleagues on declaring a Disaster Area – but did not in response to a question say when she anticipated swimming hazard-free in the Vaal River.
No further details were given by Sisulu, such as what the geographical extent of any Disaster Area zone would be or whether it would include Free State areas opposite Emfuleni which also bordered the Vaal River and severely affected the marine economy of both provinces.
She also did not give any time-frame for such a decision.
Sisulu accepted a GTCoC n invitation to a fact-finding Vaal River Cruise extended by GTCoC CEO Klippies Kritzinger to get business and civil society perspectives on the business and social impacts of the present sewage pollution crisis.
Sisulu’s visit took place against a background of increasing community resistance and sabotage against municipal infrastructure and which seems to be intensifying even as the National Defence Force withdraws its security presence from the Vaal.
“Declaring a Disaster Area should be done as soon as possible to unlock further resources for the Vaal River Intervention Project and also to cover the full scope of operations and impact zones – this will give great impetus to the excellent work already being implemented by waste water specialists ERWAT.
“Such a declaration will also dovetail with business and civil society mobilisation of skills and resources to support this and other service delivery and economic development projects which are so vital to creating investor confidence in the Vaal region,” said Cloete-Anderson.
ERWAT MD Tumelo Gopane also said the Army was withdrawing its presence from the Vaal end of January and that a security company would be taking over.
Gopane, who has impressed participants and observers with his visible leadership at grass-roots operations, said the intervention project would be vastly up-scaled now especially on the pipeline network throughout Emfuleni which he described as “a most complex” aspect of the project.