Ramaphosa 'satisfied with progress' at Emfuleni municipality

President Cyril Ramaphosa on Friday said he was satisfied with the progress made with service delivery in the Emfuleni local municipality in Gauteng. 

Speaking after meeting various stakeholders, including business, community members, religious leaders and civil society, the president said there was hope for the embattled municipality. 

“Emfuleni has been one of those sore areas in our country, particularly with regards to water and sanitation, where water treatment has been neglected for a very long time and effluent water and waste water was flowing into people’s houses and into the river as well,” he said.

Ramaphosa said the national government working together with the province and the district and local municipality, had decided to intervene. 

“I am quite satisfied with the progress that I have seen here. Real work is getting done and money is well spent. We have an implementing agent in the form of Rand Water, they are doing a really good job.”

He commended the work done, saying this was possible through working together with stakeholder from business, religious, sports and community-based organisations. 

“Many of them spoke positively about the progress that is under way here and in a few months we will be on top of this problem. We also had the department of transport here, I travelled on really bad roads and we are going to embark on a project to redo the roads to make sure that in the end we give our people a decent life.” 

The president apologised for the media not being allowed into the talks, saying the government had nothing to hide. 

Ramaphosa’s visit began with a guided tour of the Sebokeng wastewater treatment plant, which is under the department of water & sanitation’s section 63 intervention.

Rand Water has been appointed as the implementing agent to ensure service delivery issues experienced by residents are attended to. 

The SABC reported previously that in 2021 a South African Human Rights Commission report found prima facie evidence of human rights violations in the Emfuleni municipality regarding the flow of raw, untreated sewage. It flows into the streets, homes, graveyards and also the Vaal River. 

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