Rand Water made its move at the end of the same week that Eskom threatened to also attach ELM’s bank accounts but has not yet executed its own court order.

The issue now threatens residents and businesses with the possibility of power and water supply being cut by State entities Eskom and Rand Water feuding with ELM, also a State entity.

But neither Rand Water or Eskom have threatened publicly to cut off supply this time round.

The latest legal move by Rand Water has sparked accusations that it has acted with stealth to anticipate the payment to ELM of hundreds of millions of Rands in government grant funding – desperately needed for service delivery in Emfuleni.

Executive Mayor Sipho Radebe yesterday met with Rand Water to resolve the situation which further threatens to deplete service delivery funding available to the cash-strapped local authority.

Rand Water did not respond to inquiries on the matter by time of publication. ELM itself has also not formally responded publicly.

Political sources say ELM spent more than R102 million over the past year to mitigate sewage spills in Emfuleni streets and into the environmentally-sensitive Vaal River – thus actually paying for Rand Water’s R7 billion river clean-up project.

Rand Water is managing the so-called Section 63 project to clean up the Vaal River but progress has been slow amid community resistance.

ELM was forced to intervene and spend more than R102 million of its own revenue on the R7 billion project due to Rand Water’s slow implementation.

As with Eskom, ELM sources say it will continue to pay Rand Water on an affordability basis but will not compromise service delivery.

The South African Local Government Association (SALGA) has urged the national Government to take over payment of historical debt by municipalities such as ELM, which must choose between service delivery and debt payments to State entities.