Balanced on a razor blade. That is how a municipal official recently described the current water situation in town. At any time, any part of the town can be without water for an extended period of time. At this stage, the demand constantly exceeds the supply.

This situation has been continuing for so many weeks that people in town have lost count. As if power outages, planned or unplanned, are not enough, people have had to cope without this even more important commodity. One can survive for some time without electricity, hard as it is and detrimental as it is to the economy and society. But without water, the world comes to a standstill and health hazards loom.

A few weeks ago, the Zoutpansberger reported on the dire situation at the local high school, where water had to be transported to the school on a regular basis just to keep the sanitation system going and to provide drinking water for the pupils and staff. Fortunately, that situation has been remedied to the extent that no current problems exist, largely due to the goodwill of businesspeople who extended a helping hand by supplying storage tanks.

The same cannot be said about the situation in town. Large parts of it are often without water, without notice. Upon enquiry, the Zoutpansberger determined that the problem occurs right through town, from the older to the newer parts. Last week, a booster pump used to supply water from eight boreholes malfunctioned, probably from being overused. The municipality’s workers had to renovate an old pump post haste to act as substitute. By that time, the reservoir(s) had run dry and people were left stranded without water. Apart from the vandalism that sees municipal infrastructure damaged and stolen on a regular basis, the municipality apparently does not possess enough funds to keep any additional equipment as back-up in case some of the equipment breaks down or malfunctions.

This begs the following questions: How much economic development can there be in a town where some of the most basic elements essential for survival, such as water and electricity, cannot be relied on? How can municipal workers who are expected to maintain the existing infrastructure do so if they have nothing to work with? How long are taxpayers supposed to be satisfied with this state of affairs? Do the same municipal officials and councillors, who are supposed to be the town’s servants, not experience these things firsthand, and if they do, does it not bother them sufficiently to start doing something about it? The list of questions is endless, yet following last week’s water crisis, no official response or explanation was given by the municipality as to what had gone wrong.

In the meantime, it is said that an amount of several millions of rands has been obtained from the Vhembe District Municipality for the upgrading and upkeep of the water and sanitation systems in Louis Trichardt. More light on this will hopefully be shed on this issue in the next few weeks. In the meantime, residents are forced to deal with the situation in the best way they can. At least the people providing water tanks and generators have something to smile about.