Calls for action on sanitation backlog
2013-03-07 16:00
Cape Town - The DA has called on Human Settlements
Minister Tokyo Sexwale to urgently take action to reduce South Africa's large
sanitation backlog.
His department recently revealed that it spent less than
16% of its Rural Household Infrastructure Programme budget for last year
(2012/13), DA MP Stevens Mokgalapa said in a statement on Thursday.
The programme is aimed at working away rural sanitation
backlogs.
Mokgalapa said such "chronic under-spending"
had hardly made a dent in the backlog of almost 2.5 million rural households
which did not have access to sanitation.
"The department only spent R54m of its R340.6m
2012/13 financial year budget for the Rural Household Infrastructure
Programme... by the end of December last year."
This was unacceptable for a programme meant to accelerate
sanitation delivery.
"One of the reasons for this slow pace is the limited
number of service providers and their capacity.... It is clear that more
service providers are needed and those contracts currently in place should be
assessed and terminated if they cannot deliver.
"Minister Tokyo Sexwale must urgently present a plan
to Parliament on a turnaround strategy to ensure that these essential
sanitation services are delivered on time, that service providers are able to
fulfil their obligations, and that the budget allocated to the [programme] is
in fact used for the intended purpose," Mokgalapa said.
- SAPA
