Residents of Swartruggens in North West say the current water shortage in the area has reached crisis level.

The Kgetleng Rivier Local Municipality has declared the area a disaster area after the Swartruggens Dam saw record low water levels at zero capacity and the municipality was no longer able to draw water from it.

Desperate residents are forced to queue daily to source water from trucks as the water shortage in the area has reached crisis levels.

Thato Motseokae says they are forced to buy water putting even more strain on residents who are already surviving with the bare minimum.

Resident Thato Motseokae says, “Since we have been having crisis of water, we are now expected to pay and our parents are not working. Even the bucket that we are filling our water with they are not enough so sometimes we have to fill them. We come back again we wait for the truck to go fetch water and it’s a crisis.”

The situation is most hopeless for elderly residents. “It’s a complete struggle for us and we aren’t coping. The biggest problem is with our toilets. And many of us elderly people struggle because we don’t have water to take our medication.”

“We fetch water very far. It’s a struggle for me because sometimes I go to sleep at night hungry because there is no water.”

With the Swartruggens Dam nearly completely dry another local resident Leon Kelly is calling for more intensified interventions.

Kelly says, “At this stage we are in a dire crisis because nobody is getting water at this stage. And from the beginning of October already the water crisis has meant that everyone on high areas has no water and in lower areas we still had a little bit of water. So, it’s been running out, there is no tap water in town. And the only reason we still get water is due to some of the community members and our farmers…we’ve got boreholes that’s not fitted from the municipality. Why is it not fitted? There is more than enough water in the mines to bring to our side. Now they say they are working on long term solutions. It doesn’t help working on long term solutions. The previous time we had droughts, same problem, they are working on long term solutions.”

Meanwhile, the Mayor of Kgetlengrivier Local Municipality Thabo Jacobs says it is engaging with provincial and national authorities to seek assistance and intervention.

Jacobs says, “The first things the municipality has done is that we have declared this area a disaster area. Secondly, we have had interventions in terms of insuring that our people do get water. All the developments that are happening around water provision is as a result of the interventions of the municipality. We have submitted our business plan to CoGTA and we are optimistic that they will come back to us and ensure that we do that pipeline.”

The Department of Water Affairs has confirmed that four municipal water trucks are fetching water in the nearby Koster which they then deliver to Swartruggens.

This while government entities are exploring alternative water sources for the area.