/ 10 April 2014

Letters to the editor: April 11 to 16

Letters To The Editor: April 11 To 16

Water allocation is being streamlined
Shanaaz Nel's article "Water intensive energy production sucks the people dry" (March 28) is misleading. It lacks rudimentary research. How else can one explain the fact that she links the delivery of water to the department of environmental affairs instead of the department of water affairs?

There is no way that the government can allocate more water to energy production at the expense of domestic consumption. Yes, as a water-scarce country, South Africa has its own unique water challenges and consequently there are citizens who still don't have access to potable water. The department of water affairs delivers this precious resource to an estimated 95% of the population and is striving to deliver water to those who are still deprived.

The National Water Policy Review introduced by Minister Edna Molewa at the end of 2013 is a classic example of how the government is determined to fast-track the delivery of water. Through this process a plethora of water boards, in some cases proved to be cumbersome and redundant, will be reduced to nine efficient water utilities with a strict mandate to deliver basic services promptly.

Molewa will remain a custodian of water and will keep a hawkish eye on its distribution and allocation.

As matters stand, a Bill that seeks to phase out the Water Services Act, which essentially empowers local governments to manage the country's water, has been tabled before Parliament. It should be ratified soon after the general elections by the lawmakers.

The department of water affairs – not environmental affairs – celebrates National Water Week as part of an awareness campaign. It encourages the populace to use water sparingly and efficiently. During this awareness campaign, the department indeed celebrates World Water Day, because the National Water Act of 1998 recognises the availability of water to ordinary citizens as a basic human right.

Eskom, which is basically an energy-supply utility, is part of this awareness campaign. The department recognises the energy utility as an important stakeholder in the business of water allocation, but insists that it does not get preference over domestic consumption.

The assertion, therefore, by Nel that energy production "sucks the people dry" is grossly misleading. All she needs to do to get her facts and figures right is to visit the website of the department of water affairs at www.dwa.gov.za. – Themba Khumalo, media liaison officer, department of water affairs, Pretoria

Why nationalisation is an attractive option
How refreshing to read Ayanda Kota's perceptive and timely piece "The people are not part of the political process" (April 4).

At the heart of the matter lies his statement: "We are in the struggle to kill the idea that one kind of person is superior to another kind of person." This goes beyond racism, beyond colonialism, beyond capitalism: we live in a society based on the stupid and dangerous notion that some people's lives and labour are of much greater value than others'. Unemployment is just one of the difficulties that arise from this.

When I was a teenager the media made much of the "new problem" we would have to face in the future: how people were to use the immense amount of leisure time that increasing mechanisation and advancing technology would afford us all. Instead, what we have is a society made up of an overworked and underpaid workforce and a huge component of unemployed people, alongside a small group of the obscenely wealthy.

The current strike in the platinum industry is not just about wages. It is about the criminally insane idea that wealthy shareholders and captains of mining can pay themselves more in a year (in some cases in a month) than the workers who risk their health and lives in the mines will receive in a lifetime.

By what distorted logic can it be decided that the labour of a captain of industry, a popular musician, a professional sportsman or a film actor is worth thousands of times more than that of a nurse, a miner, a policeman, a street-sweeper, a plumber, a carpenter, a farm labourer or any other such valuable and useful person? By what distorted logic can it be deduced that the Earth's resources are there for the almost exclusive benefit of a small group of people who already have more than they will ever need?

In the case of the mines, the argument presented to us is that these fantastic packages and profits are necessary in order to attract the investment that alone will eradicate unemployment. More money has been invested in this country in the past 20 years than at any other time in its history, and yet our unemployment rate is higher than ever. Investors are motivated by profit, and profits are increased by higher productivity. The result is that the more investment we attract the more mechanisation follows.

We would do well to heed the warning of the Fabians: "A society which depends on the incentive of private profit is doomed."

It is small wonder that the concept of nationalisation is attractive to those who have too little. As soon as the word is mentioned, those who have too much roll their eyes and sigh as though the speaker is an idiot. It is true that nationalisation does not have the greatest of track records, but it is also true that it has not always been the disaster its detractors claim. It will remain an attractive option until its detractors offer us a viable alternative.

Unless they do, we are left with this grim warning from George Bernard Shaw: "Nothing more diabolical can be conceived than the destiny of a civilisation in which the material sources of the people's subsistence are privately owned by a handful of persons, taught from childhood that every penny they can extort from the propertyless is an addition to the prosperity of their country and an enrichment of the world at large." – John Brodrick, Johannesburg