WhatsApp’s water warriors take mayor’s place while dry Johannesburg swelters

Jeanne van Staden of Cyrildene shows some of her water supply. When we visited, Cyrildene was on its 13th day without water due to problems at the Berea reservoir. (Photo: Supplied)

By Ferial Haffajee

17 Dec 2024

How does a city get by without water in a heatwave? We went to find out.

In a sweltering heatwave, with the mercury climbing to 35℃ on most days, the main image out of Johannesburg at its festive season start was of people lugging water bottles to tankers and boreholes to get water as taps ran dry all over the city. Talk about a Christmas Grinch.

The water crisis has deepened for most of the year. Still, it was different this time: Rand Water shut the taps for 86 hours of essential maintenance to upgrade its Eikenhof pumping station, which should make things easier for the city in the medium term.

It was like a hard lockdown in Covid: you know it’s good for you, but it’s bloody tough to get through. In Coronationville, where people have protested twice for water in the past month, we found Henrietta Louw carrying her second set of bottles from a nearby mosque where a borehole has been dug to supply the community.

henrietta louw coronationvile Henrietta Louw of Coronationville on her second trip from a tanker to her home. (Photo: Supplied)

“People have been crying now for five years. They put the water on at 12 o’clock at night, and it goes off again at four o’clock. How do they do that? When you sleeping? Now people must get up and they must fill everything up when it’s sleeping time.

“One of these days, it’s Christmas. How are we gonna cook? It’s unhygienic for the toilet. And not just that, it’s a heatwave. This is a sad case, man. I must tell you.”

water coronationville This young woman in Coronationville (who didn’t want to give her name) carries trolleys of water to elderly people in Westbury. (Photo: Supplied)

Coronationville is in perennial crisis, along with many areas southwest of Johannesburg. At the weekend, protesters reportedly stoned a Johannesburg Water truck which then refused to fill tanks.

The Rahima Moosa Mother and Child Hospital runs on a borehole dug by the charity Gift of the Givers. People in zones like Corrie (as it’s called) get by with boreholes at mosques and water tankers deployed by Johannesburg Water. The city is throttling and shifting supply, so nighttime cuts and erratic returns are common.

Make a plan

In many parts of Johannesburg, the water crisis is normalised, but this weekend it was generalised, too. In Soweto, Sifiso Mabena and Bongani Khambule run a car wash on Vilakazi Street, which is often busy as clients go to surrounding restaurants and get their cars done while they dine.

It’s a well-to-do clientele, so Mabena says he makes R1,800 a day. Without water, he’s worried that there won’t be enough to go home for the holidays.

Opposite at Sakhumzi restaurant, it’s as vibey as always with amapiano blasting and people enjoying the start of the festive season. But salesperson Bhekezela (he didn’t want to give his family name) said some customers came in, asked about water and left. Without water, the toilets can get skanky, and, he says, the restaurants struggle to wash dishes and keep going.

The Hector Pieterson Museum, along with every other city property, was closed because there was no water. By Tuesday, 17 December, service offices, which people need to access the city, were also closed because of the mass water outage. The museum is usually humming with visitors, but tour guide Mlungisi Shabalala was trying to put on a brave face.

“Most of the visitors who come here are in big groups, and they need water,” he said, still offering tours of surrounding sites.

mlungisi shabalala hector pieterson Tour guide Mlungisi Shabalala at the Hector Pieterson Museum in Soweto, closed due to the water shutdown. (Photo: Supplied)

The spirit of Johannesburg’s people, South Africa’s people, is to make a plan. So, they hustle. A group of active citizens from Roshnee in Vereeniging have saved to buy a water tanker that they take to dry areas. They worked in Johannesburg this past weekend.

While some councillors have been on the ground, the mayor, Dada Morero, had only reposted notifications from Rand Water (the bulk supplier) and Johannesburg Water (the municipal supplier to homes and businesses) at the time of writing.

The crisis has yet to be led from the front by any political leader tasked with the job, and the gap has been filled by water warriors on WhatsApp. The chat platform is how most people stay informed and connected to information about the water crisis: there’s a group to spot the tankers; others run by councillors; several in case there’s a system failure managed by a disaster specialist.

Johannesburg increasingly self-governed

Johannesburg is increasingly a city where citizens self-govern using WhatsApp as representative local government systems reveal their inadequacies. In Cyrildene to the city’s east, residents had been without water for 13 days (by 17 December) because the Berea Reservoir was down. Half of the city’s reservoirs are leaky, and the system is so old that even a necessary upgrade by Rand Water can put pressure on it.

water johannesburg bruma Petrol attendants at a Bruma petrol station. The area hadn’t had water for 13 days by 17 December. (Photo: Supplied)

To use a metaphor from Rand Water: if Albany is shut for maintenance, Pick n Pay should still have bread. This means that bulk suppliers are constantly upgraded and maintained, but citizens shouldn’t notice it in their supply in an ideal metropolitan water governance model. But because Johannesburg’s system is so old and ill-maintained, even routine work by Rand Water has a domino effect on the cities it supplies.

Read more: Joburg water crisis — experts urge collective action to restore Johannesburg’s water system

When water systems are switched on and off so frequently, air gets into them, causing air locks that can cause bursts. That’s why the city’s streets are filled with dongas (big holes), as Johannesburg Water workers have to dig them to reach the burst pipes and make emergency repairs.

Waitrons from the Chinatown restaurants in Cyrildene push and pull makeshift trolleys up a steepish hill to collect water from a municipal tanker at a nearby garage. It’s back-breaking work.

Jeanne van Staden invites us in to show what living with a general crisis looks like. She fills her cistern manually most days; five-litre bottles are stored everywhere, and a flow bin on her roof collects rainwater. This is how it will be in Johannesburg more and more because the city can’t afford the price tag of thoroughly refurbishing the water network.

water jeanne van Staden Jeanne van Staden of Cyrildene shows some of her water supply. When we visited, Cyrildene was on its 13th day without water due to problems at the Berea reservoir. (Photo: Supplied)

“I won’t sit here and cry my eyes out and not have something in place,” she says.

Everywhere we go, there’s the Johannesburg spirit of getting on with it. The largest WhatsApp group and channel of the Water Crisis Committee has about 770 members, says Ingrid Bester, who is one of the committee’s leaders and administrators and runs its WhatsApp group and channel.

It distributes information and shares knowledge in a network that spreads across the city because it includes residents’ associations, community associations and localised street groups. It is non-partisan.

“Our group acts as a voice in tackling the water crisis. We identify systemic issues and hold those accountable to achieve lasting solutions. We prioritise long-term change over systemic fixes and we work in solidarity with other civil society groups,” says Bester.

During the extended weekend shutdown, the group distributed information on where to find water, maps to explain topology and hydrology, building water literacy and posted helpful hints on how to get through a water crisis in a heatwave. They also dampened frayed tempers.

Read more: Engineering will solve the Joburg water supply problem, not short-term political games

The infrastructure upgrade was necessary and supported by the Water Crisis Committee, which is also co-led by Dr Ferrial Adam of WaterCan, the community action network.

“This is the final phase of a three-year project. Once completed, the Eikenhof system will be more resilient, ensuring continued water supply even during maintenance or unforeseen pump failures. This improvement will directly benefit municipalities and customers, ensuring a more stable water flow.”

While Rand Water completed its project by 16 December, Johannesburg’s entire system could take five to 12 days to recover. Reservoirs are opened only once they reach a stipulated depth, and at the time of writing, several parts of the city are still dry. DM

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Make a plan

Johannesburg increasingly self-governed