APF

Constitutional Court rules against Phiri

Nic — 2009-10-08T22:55:04Z

JUDGMENT SHOWS A LAZY LEGALISM AND COMPLETELY BIASED AND CONTRADICTORY REASONING IN RULING THAT FREE BASIC WATER POLICY IS ‘REASONABLE' AND PRE-PAID WATER METERS ARE ‘LAWFUL'

This morning, the Constitutional Court of South Africa handed down judgment in the five year long Phiri water rights case. The judgment was given in respect of an appeal by the Phiri applicants, of the previous judgment in this case handed down on 25th March 2009, by the Supreme Court of Appeal (SCA) in Bloemfontein. In turn, the SCA judgment was the result of an appeal by the City of Johannesburg/ Johannesburg Water (the ‘City') and the Department of Water Affairs and Forestry (DWAF) of the previous ruling of the (then) Johannesburg High Court in April 2008.

The summary judgment of the Constitutional Court is as follows: The City's Free Basic Water policy falls within the bounds of reasonableness and therefore is not in conflict with either section 27 of the Constitution or with the national legislation regulating water services. The installation of pre-paid meters in Phiri is found to be lawful. Accordingly, the orders made by the Supreme Court of Appeal and the High Court are set aside.

The applicants, the Coalition, Phiri residents and no doubt millions of poor people across South Africa are extremely disappointed by what is a shocking judgment. The court's ruling, written by Justice Kate O'Regan (now retired from the Court) and supported by all other 8 judges sitting in the case, is a classic example of a lazy legalism as well as wholly biased and contradictory reasoning.

It is impossible to deal with all the arguments/positions taken by the Constitutional Court in its 90 page judgment but a few, brief responses are absolutely necessary.

In relation to testimony and evidence on almost every substantive matter raised in the case, the Constitutional Court takes the City of Johannesburg (CoJ) /Johannesburg Water (JW) at their word and defers to the twisted logic (read: propaganda) of their arguments. It is as if the thousands of pages of evidence and testimony provided by the Phiri applicants in countering the same from CoJ/JW is simply ignored and/or considered irrelevant. One example will have to suffice: Despite mountains of credible evidence to show that there was no serious ‘consultation' with community residents by CoJ/JW in implementing Operation Gcin'amanzi (a matter the High Court judgment referred to as a ‘public relations exercise') and that the pre-paid meters were forced onto residents the judgment parrots, almost verbatim, the CoJ/JW propaganda: Twenty community facilitators were appointed by Johannesburg Water to conduct house visits. The task was to explain the project and its implications carefully to each household. By the end of the implementation process in Phiri in February 2005, all but eight of the 1 771 households in the area had opted for either Service Level 2 or a pre-paid meter. Indeed the vast majority selected the latter. Clearly, the Constitutional Court has no respect for the honest and unfiltered views and experiences of poor residents.
The reasoning of the judgment in relation to the constitutional obligations of the state (in this case, CoJ/JW) to provide access to sufficient water is completely contradictory. On the one hand the judgment says that the state does have the constitutional obligation to progressively realise the right of access but on the other it says that the determination of the content of that right (in the case of water, the state's unilateral decision in 2001 to implement a universal free basic water - FBW -policy of 6 kilolitres per month, per household) cannot be seen as a minimum core and that the said right cannot be achieved immediately. What the judgment thus effectively says, but does not recognise itself, is that there is no foundational or time/spatial basis upon which to adjudge what constitutes ‘progressive realisation'. This is why, eight years after the implementation of the state's FBW policy and with no change in that policy throughout those eight years, the court can find that this constitutes “progressive realisation” and that those who now seek to redefine what this means are guilty of seeking “immediate” remedy. In logical terms, it is a circular absurdity. One is left to seriously ponder then if the constitutional phrase – progressive realisation – has any practical meaning at all when it comes to the most basic of all socio-economic rights, other than to allow the state to do whatever it pleases, whenever it pleases and at whatever pace pleases it. Indeed, this seems to be exactly what the judgment is endorsing - even if, as it appears, it has no idea it is doing so - when it states that, “the City is not under a constitutional obligation to provide any particular amount of free water to citizens per month.”
As if to compound the cyclical contradictions, the judgment further states that, what the right of access to sufficient water … requires, will vary over time and context. Fixing a quantified content might, in a rigid and counter-productive manner, prevent an analysis of context. The concept of reasonableness places context at the centre of the enquiry and permits an assessment of context to determine whether a government programme is indeed reasonable. This is wholly ignored in the reasoning behind the judgment's section on ‘progressive realisation' of water rights. If the state can ‘fix a quantified content' in relation to free basic water provision in 2001 and not change it for eight years (read: no progression), then why is this not seen as being “rigid and counterproductive” and ‘preventing an analysis of context'? If context is indeed at the “centre of the enquiry” of what constitutes “reasonableness” then surely it must be equally assessed/applied ‘over time'. Besides the fact that one part of a paragraph in the judgment wholly ignored the other, it is unfortunately for the poor (and for rational logic as well as historians), that the Constitutional Court clearly thinks context is frozen in time - and thus also, the concept of ‘reasonableness'.
In a further case of biased illogic, the judgment rejects the applicants request for free basic water provision to be changed to a per-person allocation instead of the present per-household allocation (as this clearly discriminates against poor households in townships which are much larger than richer suburban households) because the City of Johannesburg presents cogent evidence that it is difficult to establish how many people are living on one stand at any given time” (here it is worth noting that the judgment relies on statistical evidence on households from the eight-year old 2001 Census). But then the judgment goes on to say that the CoJ's indigent, means-testing policy (which does not even cover one fifth of indigents in the City and is, by all accounts, an administrative nightmare) has an “indisputably laudable purpose … it seeks to ensure that those most in need benefit from government services. So, according to the Constitutional Court, the City can't implement a per-person allocation due to ‘fact' that it will be too administratively burdensome (and because the City says so) but it endorses a means-testing approach instead which, of course, is not nearly as administratively burdensome (again, because the City says so) and has a ‘good purpose' to boot.
And lastly … the judgment dismisses the applicants argument that the automatic cutting off of water after the free basic amount is dispensed from pre-paid water meters, does not constitute “discontinuation” (and thus an illegal/unconstitutional act). It makes this finding using the following reasoning: the ordinary meaning of “discontinuation” is that something is made to cease to exist. The water supply does not cease to exist when a pre-paid meter temporarily stops the supply of water. It is suspended until either the customer purchases further credit or the new month commences with a new monthly basic water supply whereupon the water supply recommences. It is better understood as a temporary suspension in supply, not a discontinuation. Here then, we have the highest court in the land saying that those poor people with pre paid water meters must not think that their water supply has discontinued when their taps run dry because the meter has cut the supply … they must imagine that it is ‘temporarily suspended' until such time as they can find the money to buy more water credit or until the next month arrives. Such ‘logic', and even worse that it is wrapped up in legal dressing and has such crucial practical consequences, is nothing less than mind boggling and an insult both to the poor and to the constitutional imperatives of justice and equality.

The Constitutional Court notes at the beginning of its judgment that, “this is the first time” that the constitutional provision on the right of access to water “has been considered by this Court.” This makes the judgment doubly tragic. The Court had a historic opportunity to give meaningful, lived content to the right to water, to strike a constitutional blow for the poor in their struggle to fully enjoy the most basic of all human needs. It is to their, and our country's, discredit that they have miserably failed.

Our disappointment should not be mistaken for resignation. As we have said from the very beginning of this case, irregardless of what transpires on the legal terrain, the struggle for accessible, affordable and adequate water will not stop. How can it, when there continues to be such glaring socio-economic inequality and injustice.

The Coalition would like to extend a huge thank you to our legal team at the Centre for Applied Legal Studies – particularly Jackie Dugard – as well as our lawyers throughout the case, Wim Trengove and Nadine Fourie and to all who assisted with, and worked on, this case over the years. To the individual applicants, residents of Phiri and many other poor communities (both here and abroad) … the struggle continues!

Film release: Amanzi Ngawethu / Water is Ours (2009)

Nic — 2009-08-30T21:17:55Z

A six-year legal battle for water rights in South African culminated in the Constitutional Court hearing of the case on 2nd Sept. The Amanzi Ngawethu documentary video was released worldwide in solidarity on the same day.

Amanzi Ngawethu (Water is Ours) is spreading the word about a critical moment for water struggles in South Africa.

On the 2nd & 3rd of September 2009, the Constitutional Court of South Africa heard the final appeal in a case brought by five Soweto residents challenging prepaid water meters and insufficient free basic water. The Bill of Rights of the South African Constitution guarantees right of access to sufficient water.

However, poor communities in Johannesburg's townships do not have sufficient water and do not receive the same water service as the richer suburbs. This six year legal battle is working to secure constitutional rights for all - water is a right not a privilege!

Diverse forces have come together - from community mobilisation to self-organised water services to legal action - in powerful struggles which have won an historic High Court victory and empowered people to remove prepaid water meters and reconnect to free water, despite threats of criminalisation. In that spirit, Amanzi Ngawethu (Water is Ours) brings together protest songs, photos and video from people and organisations involved in the struggle and working in solidarity.

The residents of Phiri along with their legal team, supporters & millions of poor people in South Africa & across the world are waiting for the judgement by the Constitutional Court. Whatever the outcome of this legal case, the struggle to ensure accessible, adequate & affordable water for all will continue.

Language: english and zulu
Also available with catalan subtitles
12 minutes

Individual links:

Medium file (12MB): blip.tv/file/2528913

Light file (6.5MB): blip.tv/file/2532707

Film Downloads:

Amanzi Ngawethu (Water is Ours) - medium quality - 12MB

Amanzi Ngawethu (Water is Ours) - low quality - 7MB

Amanzi Ngawethu (Water is Ours) by Coalition Against Water Privatisation, Anti-Privatisation Forum, Centre for Applied Legal Studies, Friction Films and Unitarian Universalist Service Committee is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 2.5 South Africa License.
Based on a work at frictionfilms.blip.tv.

See also the video produced by the Centre for Applied Legal Studies on the prepaid water meter case.

APF media fundraising drive

The Anti Privatisation Forum's media committee is raising funds for the purchase of a digital camera and audio recorders, which equipment will add to the coverage of the APF's struggles for basic services, housing and education. All donations are appreciated and will be shown on the APF website to give us and you a running count of how much has been raised.

Please deposit donations into the bank account detailed below, marked 'APF media'.

Thank you.

Account Name: Anti-Privatisation Forum
Bank: First National Bank
Branch: Bank City
Bank Address: Block A, #3 First Place, Bank City, FNB, Johannesburg, 2000
Branch Code: 250805
Account Number: 62027851452
Type of Account: Cheque
Swift Code: FIRN ZAJJA046
Telephone: (27 11) 352 1338/492 3321/492 3345
Contact Person: Azer Moosa (011 352-8905)
Foreign Transfer Desk: 352 8290 (tel), 352 8219 (Fax) – Attn: Paulina (e-bus: 083 123 3000)
Bank and ABA # for US wire transfers - J.P. Morgan-Chase Manhattan (021000021)

Supreme Court Of Appeal (SCA) hands down judgment on Phiri Water Case

Nic — 2009-03-25T04:00:00Z

Contradictory nature of judgment means that battle for full right to water and against pre-paid water meters continues

This morning, the Supreme Court of Appeal (SCA) in Bloemfontein handed down its judgment in the years-long Phiri water case. The judgment was the result of an appeal by the City of Johannesburg/Johannesburg Water (hereafter, the ‘City') and the Department of Water Affairs and Forestry (DWAF) of the previous ruling of the Johannesburg High Court in April 2008, which declared that prepaid water meters were both illegal and unconstitutional and ordered the City to provide residents with 50 litres of free water per day.

The order of judgment by the SCA reads as follows:

“The appeal is upheld and the order by the (High) court is replaced with the following order:

The decision of the first respondent and/or the second respondent to limit the free basic water supply to the residents of Phiri to 25 litres per person per day or 6 kl per household per month is reviewed and set aside.

It is declared:

a) That 42 litres water per Phiri resident per day would constitute sufficient water in terms of s 27(1) of the Constitution.

(b) That the first respondent is, to the extent that it is in terms of s 27(1) of the Constitution reasonable to do so, having regard to its available resources and other relevant considerations, obliged to provide 42 litres free water to each Phiri resident who cannot afford to pay for such water.

The first and second respondents are ordered to reconsider and reformulate their free water policy in the light of the preceding paragraphs of this order.

Pending the reformulation of their free water policy the first and second respondents are ordered to provide each account holder in Phiri who is registered with the first respondent as an indigent with 42 litres of free water per day per member of his or her household.

It is declared that the prepayment water meters used in Phiri Township in respect of water service level 3 consumers are unlawful.

The order in paragraph 5 is suspended for a period of two years in order to enable the first respondent to legalise the use of prepayment meters in so far as it may be possible to do so.”

The SCA's decision to set aside the City's present policy of limiting the provision of free basic water to 6kl per month/per household is welcomed. CAWP has, from the very beginning of this case argued that this unilateral limitation is a violation of the constitutional right to adequate water (for the poor). However, the SCA's determination that 42 litres of water per person/per day constitutes ‘sufficient' water in terms of the Constitution, while an improvement on the present free basic amount provided, falls short of what is universally accepted and recognised as the minimum amount of water needed for basic human needs and dignity.

Even more problematic though, is that the SCA's order to the City to provide this amount, is conditional. The very same City that has, at every opportunity, resisted the legitimate claims and demands of poor communities for adequate amounts of free basic water, is effectively allowed carte blanche (through its own assessment of what constitutes ‘reasonableness' and ‘through available resources') to determine the timing, character and extent of changes to its existing ‘free water policy'. To make matters worse, the SCA order explicitly states that while the City is ‘reformulating' its policy, the provision of the increased free basic amount must only be available to those who are registered as indigents with the City. As CAWP and many others have pointed out for the past several years, not only does the indigency process constitute a demeaning and patronising treatment of poor people but the City's Indigent Register is a complete administrative mess and institutional disaster and those that are registered constitute less than a quarter of poor households in Johannesburg. In making such an order, the SCA allows the City, once again, to unilaterally determine and manage who enjoys their constitutional right to water and when. Crucially, it effectively legalises the treatment of the poor majority as second class citizens.

The SCA's judgment that pre-paid water meters are unlawful represents an approach that privileges legal technicalities over constitutional right and protection. The basis for the declaration of unlawfulness of the pre-paid meters is the absence of the necessary City by-laws. The order gives the City two years to pass the necessary by-laws so that the pre-paid meters can then be ‘legalised'. In practical terms, this means that the City can thus continue to forcibly install pre-paid meters in poor communities (while providing wealthier residents with full credit metered water systems and thus allowing those with the means to do, to consume as much water as they want as long as they can afford it). This is a legal cop-out. The constitutional issues around discrimination and representation/administrative justice in relation to the pre-paid water meters that were properly addressed in the High Court ruling have simply been ignored. As such, water provision remains in the realm of privileged commodification - the full enjoyment of the right to water still being determined by ones' class status and geographical location.

On the legal front, the SCA judgment is a case of ‘one step forward, two steps back'. As the Phiri applicants, CAWP and all of its associated members have said since the start of this case, the struggle for the full right to water will continue, on the numerous fronts, regardless of what happens in courts of law. While we are consulting with our legal team as to the next steps forward in this case (which would, of necessity, involve representations to the Constitutional Court), the realities on the ground in poor communities enjoin a continuous battle. In this respect, there will be no let-up. The realisation and enjoyment of real, practical democracy can only be achieved and sustained by the power and actions of ordinary people.

THE STRUGGLE CONTINUES!

Turkish police shoot on protesters at the World Water Forum

Nic — 2009-03-19T04:00:00Z

At 9.30 this morning, a group of about 300 Turkish and international activists began a peaceful march towards the entrance of the 5th World Water Forum in Beyoglu to express their concerns about the political agenda of the event and prevent people getting inside. Turkish police forces, outnumbering by far protesters, quickly intervened and charged, using rubber bullets, separating Turkish activists from international protesters and violently dispersing the action.

17 Turkish activists from the "No to commercialisation of water platform" were arrested, mostly women who couldn't escape fast enough and one high-profile leader of anti-dam movements. Arrested activists are now in hospital, waiting for their transfer to Vatan police station where they might be prosecuted for illegal protest. The renowned Turkish hospitality seems to not apply to those critical of the World Water Forum.

Other activists then entered the WWF venue to protest against this unacceptable way of treating democratic protests and further challenge the World Water Council and Turkish government's water privatisation plans. The Coalition Against Water Privatisation strongly condemns the repression by the Turkish government; people must express themselves without any fear of police brutality.

The Coalition and the South African Municipal Workers Union (SAMWU) will be presenting the South African water struggle and the landmark Johannesburg High Court ruling (that outlawed prepaid water meters) at the alternative people's forum. As part of the international day of action, CAWP will be picketing at Johannesburg Water office and holding community mass meetings concerning access to water.

The 6th World Water Forum is illegitimate and its nothing but a gathering of the water industry mafias. The global water movement vowed that they will organize hard to make sure that this is the last World Water Forum organized by water thieves. The next must be organized by the United Nations (UN), and every country must make sure that the human right to water is protected and that access to water and sanitation is a priority.

Appeal Against Landmark High Court Water Case Judgement Concludes at Supreme Court of Appeal

Nic — 2009-02-26T05:00:00Z

For three days (Monday 23rd - Wednesday 25th February) the appeal against the historic High Court judgement on the rights of poor communities to equitable, adequate and affordable access to, and enjoyment of, water was heard in front of the Supreme Court of Appeal (SCA) in Bloemfontein.

On the first day of the hearing, the small court over-flowed with residents of affected communities in Gauteng and the Free State, under the banner of CAWP. Also present throughout the hearing were two of the original complainants in the case - Jennifer Makotsoane and Grace Munyai.

The appellants - the City of Johannesburg, Johannesburg Water and the Department of Water Affairs & Forestry - brought nothing new to the case, repeating the same old and discredited arguments. As had been the case in the High Court, the appellants tried to convince the SCA that there was no need for an increased free water allocation because of their indigent/social ‘packages' for the poor and that pre-paid water meters were perfectly legal, non-discriminatory and popularly accepted mechanisms of water delivery that have no negative impact on the rights and lives of poor communities.

Our legal team (i.e. for the ‘respondents' in this hearing) alongside the amicus curiae of the Centre for Housing Rights & Education reiterated and expanded on, the core arguments made to the High Court. In particular, the immediate need for practical relief and affirmation of the constitutional right to water access - through the courts - was highlighted, specifically given the length of the case and the continued deprivation of rights.

It is expected that the SCA will deliver its judgement within the next 4-6 weeks. While we wait once again for the slow wheels of the justice system to move along, the struggle on the ground continues.

WATER IS LIFE!

Water struggle reaches Supreme Court of Appeal

Nic — 2009-02-19T11:17:28Z

The appeal by the City of Johannesburg against the Johannesburg High Court ruling on prepaid water meters and the free basic water allocation takes place in Bloemfontein from Monday to Wednesday next week (23-25 February).

In its historic judgement handed down on the 30th April 2008, the Johannesburg High Court declared prepaid water meters both illegal and unconstitutional and ordered the City of Johannesburg (CoJ) to provide residents with 50 litres of free water per person/per day . Despite the judgement being celebrated by poor communities across South Africa and supported by a wide range of domestic and international unions, political parties and non-governmental organisations, Johannesburg Mayor, Amos Masondo - alongside Johannesburg Water and the Department of Water Affairs & Forestry (DWAF) - appealed the judgement. More recently, the National Treasury has applied to be an amicus in support of the appeal. And so, now into its sixth year, this landmark case to secure basic constitutional rights to water for all, heads to the SCA.

The character of the appeal combined with the timing of the hearing, are particularly ironic.

At the same time that the ruling African National Congress (ANC) is making endless electoral promises to the poor about their rights to adequate, accessible and affordable basic needs/services, the ANC government's own officials/departments are attempting to reverse one of the few legal rulings that gives positive effect to those rights.

At the same time that thousands of people in poor communities are suffering from a cholera epidemic - a direct result of the lack of decent water supply and service - the appeal seeks to prevent the poor from enjoying the same quality and levels of water service as provided to the middle class and rich.

At the same time when corruption and fraud within the leadership ranks of the ANC and the government it runs are at an all-time high, we see mounds of public monies being used to enforce the poor to ‘conserve' and accept the patronising classification of ‘indigent'.

At the same time that millions across the country are buckling under the weight of the ongoing and combined crises of the failed privatised and individualistic gospel of the capitalist ‘free market', we have government trying to uphold and defend the very same gospel when it comes to the most basic of human rights and needs, water.

Something has gone horribly wrong when those who rule and speak in the name of democracy attempt to deny basic democratic/constitutional rights to those who are most in need. As CAWP has stated since the beginning of this case so many years ago, if the basic human and constitutional right to adequate, accessible and affordable water is enshrined in law as a commodified privilege only to be enjoyed by those who can afford it, then we have completely lost our way as a society.

While CAWP, its legal team and all of those who are in support, hope that the SCA will uphold the Johannesburg High Court ruling, the struggle for water - both inside and outside the courts - will continue. While we will pursue the legal case to the Constitutional Court if necessary, we will never stop our collective defence of, and fight for, water to become what it always has been and always should be - a natural, public resource essential to all life, to be shared and enjoyed universally.

WATER IS LIFE!

SAMWU in Cape Town joins the struggle to remove prepaids

Nic — 2009-02-10T22:54:52Z

The Coalition Against Water Privatisation applauds the statement issued by the South Africa Municipal Workers Unions (SAMWU) in Cape Town that affirms the union's principled opposition to prepaid water meters. SAMWU in Cape Town is fighting against the imposition and the use of prepaid water meters in poor communities where the DA-led Cape Town municipality has been installing the hated meters since 2006. It is a hand of solidarity extended by organised labour to poor communities that the Coalition hopes other branches of SAMWU, as well as other unions, will emulate. The struggle to scrap prepaid meters, flow restrictors and other devices that tamper with people's access to water is closer to won with greater unity between our sections of the working class.

Government has been persistent in its recommendation of prepaid water meters. SAMWU Cape Town observes that the ANC announced in 2005 that it would no longer go ahead with these technologies but under the administration of the Democratic Alliance the prepaids were re-introduced in 2006. Certain impoverished working class areas were targeted in what the City of Cape Town claimed at the time were only pilot projects and would be evaluated after 6 months. This evaluation never took place and the installation of prepaid systems has proceeded. This is the very same tactic that Johannesburg Water used in Phiri where the ‘pilot project' of Operation Gcina'manzi became a fait accompli for the rest of Soweto.

Prepaids and cholera

The introduction of prepaid water meters by the African National Congress government brought nothing but suffering to poor people's lives. Their affects on public health were immediately evident from the time of their first imposition when nine communal standpipes on the outskirts of Empangeni in KwaZulu Natal were converted to a prepaid system in 2000 in Empangeni. These nine taps were at the epicentre of what unfolded as the worst cholera outbreak by then in the history of South Africa. More cases of cholera were recorded from August 2000 to April 2001 than in the prior twenty years.

With cholera raging again in Limpopo and Mpumalanga, the costs of restricting access to water can no longer be carried by the poor. It is untrue that cholera has come across the border with Zimbabwe because the bacterial contagion will only thrive wherever water services are lacking and people depend on naturally occurring water. Cholera patients from Bushbuckridge in Mpumalanga, as the case in point, have been nearly all residents of the area without proper water or sanitation connections. Cost recovery leads to high morbidity in a poor country like South Africa. The CAWP argues that the ANC government cannot continue laying the lives of poor people on the line of its neoliberal plans.

Unifying the water struggle

The CAWP together with social movements like the Anti-Privatisation Forum (APF) and institutions like the Centre for Applied Legal Study's (CALS) as well as SAMWU have been in supports of communities fighting to protect the human right to water and will continue to doing so.

The CAWP and SAMWU are discussing a joint programme that will focus on intensifying the struggle against the use of prepaid water meters. Residents of Soweto have been implementing Operation Vula'Amanzi - a campaign to remove prepaid water meters. CAWP welcomes SAMWU's initiative of taking serious steps to “support all communities who wish to have these devices removed for good.” These devices are installed against people's will and therefore have no place in our communities.

For more information/comments please contact: Patrick “Patra” Sindane CAWP Organiser 073 052 7005

Women for Water march 12 February

Nic — 2009-02-10T00:41:32Z


Onstage

POOR WOMEN IN SOUTHERN AFRICA HIT HARDEST BY CONTINUED LACK OF ACCESS TO ADEQUATE, AFFORDABLE AND CLEAN WATER

NOW IS THE TIME TO SPEAK OUT AND BE HEARD!

MARCH TO MAYOR MASONDO'S OFFICE ON THURSDAY 12TH FEBRUARY. STARTING FROM JOHANNESBURG LIBRARY GARDENS @ 10H00


march front

Across our region, there is a water crisis and it is poor women who are bearing the brunt. The cause of the crisis is as simple as it is tragic - continued lack of access to adequate, affordable and clean water. In Zimbabwe, hundreds have died and tens of thousands are suffering from cholera, which is now spreading across South Africa. While people in poor communities in general are the victims, it is women who are most affected. It is women, particularly in rural areas, who travel long distances to access water supplies. It is women who make up the majority of those suffering from HIV-AIDS and with whom the burden of care most often lies. It is women whose health and human dignity is assaulted by being unable to wash during their menstrual periods. It should come as little surprise though, that it is men who make the political and policy decisions that continue to feed this crisis.

Many of the ‘stories' that make up this crisis for women are not spoken about publicly since they are, in our patriarchal societies, considered to be ‘private'. An ‘enforced' silence has taken hold, where most women fear social sanction and individual degradation for talking about, and struggling against, a water crisis that prevents us from not being able to maintain personal hygiene and forces us to become perpetual water ‘victims'. However, we can no longer privatise the scale and impact of this crisis, we cannot keep ‘quiet'.

The men who make the political and policy decisions that have led to the present water crisis, have forgotten that it is women who make up the majority of their ‘constituencies'. These same men have forgotten that it is women who suffer the most. They have lost all sense of the tragic seriousness of the situation.

In Johannesburg, Mayor Masondo's continuing mission to forcefully impose pre-paid water meters onto poor communities threatens to put women in the same shoes as those of their Zimbabwean counterparts. Despite the historic High Court judgement in April last year declaring pre-paid water meters to be unconstitutional and ordering the City of Johannesburg to provide 50 litres of clean water per day, per person, Masondo has chosen to celebrate their discriminatory, illegal and inhumane effects. Alongside Johannesburg Water and the Department of Water Affairs, Masondo has appealed the High Court judgement (which is to be heard in the Supreme Court of Appeals in Bloemfontein from 23-25th February). In doing so, he has spit in the face of all poor communities, but more especially, women.

Water is a natural resource and every human being (not just South Africans as per our Constitution) has a right to adequate, affordable and clean water. These are fundamental and inalienable rights which do not need the approval of men and are not reducible to issues of national ‘sovereignty'. If poor women in particular, in the richest city in Africa, cannot enjoy such rights then what are the chances for the tens of millions of poor women across our region to enjoy the same?

We will be marching on Masondo's office, not only to ‘name and shame' him but also to speak out and break the ‘silence' for all poor women


I'm sick and tired of being sick and tired


Mamthembu on the mic


APF cadre


Down Rissik


Stop the war on women's bodies


ANC poster: Working together we can do more


Chasing the cops


Where's Mayor Masondo?


Virginia speaking


MaTladi


Shirley Mguli from Petitions Management to receive memo


Makoma removes her panties


Delivering the memorandum


Cops doing laundry

Cholera in Zimbabwe and South Africa is a political emergency

Nic — 2009-01-23T00:34:35Z

The Cholera Crisis in Zimbabwe (and now increasingly, in South Africa) calls for political will to confront the ultimate perpetrators and deliver clean, accessible public water supplies.

On top of the untold human misery resulting from Zimbabwe's economic meltdown and political repression over the last several years, there are now thousands of people who have died of cholera while tens of thousands more lie hopeless in decrepit public hospitals without medication and necessary equipment. The reality is that, like the judiciary and education there no longer exists a Zimbabwean health system. All the while of course, Robert Mugabe and his cronies continue to enjoy the privileges of their plunder, Mugabe and his wife having recently returned from a luxury holiday and shopping spree in the Far East whilst the country falls further into the abyss.

The cholera crisis in Zimbabwe could have been prevented long ago but is it is now very real, not only for Zimbabweans but also for increasing numbers of poor South Africans. It is rapidly becoming a regional crisis with 13 deaths confirmed and more than 2,000 people having been infected within the borders of our country. The Emfuleni municipality admitted several weeks ago that the Vaal River has been partially contaminated (despite repeated denials by Rand Water and government) and there has been a serious under-reporting of cholera-related cases both in Gauteng and other provinces. Many smaller rivers in the north of the country - often the sole source of water for poor rural communities - have fallen victim as well.

The Coalition Against Water Privatisation (CAWP) welcomes the roles played by humanitarian NGOs as well as the United Nations (UN) in trying to assist with the necessary medications and support for cholera victims. However, in order for a permanent solution to be found, what is really needed is political will on the part of the government of South Africa to not only remove all political and economic support for Mugabe and his cronies but also to provide clean, accessible and publicly owned/serviced water supplies to all who live in this country.

The cholera crisis is a human-made problem and it affects mostly those who are in poverty. Organisations like CAWP and many others across South Africa are responding in practical ways, but with seriously limited resources and capacity. A permanent solution requires recognising the human and democratic right of the majority poor (whether in South Africa or Zimbabwe) to basic needs and services as well as meaningful human solidarity and effective water service management/delivery on the part of those who claim to democratically represent that majority. The fundamental question is: does our government have the political will to act?

For more information contact CAWP- Organiser Patrick "Patra" Sindane @ 073 052 7005

Water struggle reaches the Supreme Court of Appeal

Nic — 2008-12-09T22:02:51Z

CAWP can now announce that the SCA has set a date for the appeal hearing in Bloemfontein: it will be on the 23-25 of February, 2009 when Phiri residents and all of Soweto will be listening to news from Bloemfontein.

On the 30th of April 2008 The Johannesburg High Court declared prepaid water meters both illegal and unconstitutional and ordered the city to provide each resident with 50 litres of free water per day. We celebrated the end of the prepaids together with other community organisations, here and internationally.

The City of Johannesburg lodged an appeal just two weeks after judge M.P. Tsoka's ruling. The arrogant city mayor, Amos Masondo, publicly attacked Tsoka and vowed to continue the fight against ordinary residents who just trying to protect their access to basic water.

While waiting for the date of the appeal hearing from the Supreme Court of Appeal (SCA), CAWP has continued with its campaigns and activities. Hundreds of angry residents marched to the City of Johannesburg offices on the 11th of November 2008. They marched with uprooted meters and summonses that the City has been serving on residents who have removed the meters. These were dumped at the City's door.

This comes at the right time for the Coalition, which is preparing for the counter World Water Forum in Istanbul, Turkey in March. Whatever ruling the SCA makes, it will not take away the significance of this chapter in what is an international fight for water as a human right, which must be defended by all means.

APF