ADM cuts water as drought hits hard

Municipal water is being turned off at night for thousands of Dutywa and Butterworth residents.

This follows dire water shortages in parts of the Eastern Cape which have forced the Amathole district municipality (ADM) to institute water restrictions

The restrictions come as Water Affairs and Sanitation Minister Nomvula Mokonyane approved a plan to re-allocate funding from conditional grants in December, giving the green light for R20-million to be made available to build a pipeline from Dutywa east water supply scheme to Dutywa town and surrounding areas.

Construction of the pipeline is expected to take eight months.

The water restrictions that kicked in on Monday, were announced in ADM mayor Nomasikizi Khonza’s report to last Friday’s council meeting.

Khonza said the “evening water cuts” would be phased in to all towns within the district.

“The water-shedding started in Butterworth this week. We were drawing water from Xhilinxa dam in order to assist Mbhashe. But we could not do this any further this year because Xilinxa is also running dry.

“Our main concern is that if rain does not fall by March, Butterworth (Mnquma) will be facing the water shortages we are experiencing in Dutywa (Mbhashe),” she added.

“We want people to use water as sparingly as possible. We are introducing these water cuts at night to minimise loss of water through leakages. We are not introducing these cuts in Dutywa and Mnquma only. We will roll them out to other towns as well,” the mayor said.

Khonza’s report states that over the past two years there has been limited rainfall in the eastern region of the municipality.

These included Mbhashe, Mnquma and the northern parts of Amahlathi local municipality.

“The three supply dams in Dutywa are now dry and from May 2014 there has been a continuous decline in the Xilinxa storage dam which supplies the town of Butterworth and surrounding areas.”