A fortnight ago, the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) launched its Human Development Report 2006 in Cape Town — a diabolically appropriate choice. South Africa is apparently considered the UNDP’s ideal setting — and maybe deservedly so — for what might be called ”talk left” policies accompanied by ”turn right” practices: turning the tap off, that is to say.
The next day the Mail & Guardian carried an essay headlined ”Water is a human right”, by UNDP administrator Kemal Dervis and Finance Minister Trevor Manuel. The UNDP’s 20-litre per person daily target provides just one and a half flushes of the toilet. At least, recommend Dervis and Manuel, ”those who cannot afford to pay, get it for free”. They argue that ”in South Africa, the basic policy framework” along these lines ”is now in place” thanks to ”the adoption of a rights-based approach to water supply”.
In reality, South Africa’s ”basic policy framework” for water pricing is still far from being rights-based. Its roots can be found in these post-apartheid decisions:
- The state has drastically increased the price of municipal water since 1994, especially affecting low-income black people.
- Operating subsidies from national to municipal governments were chopped during the 1990s by 85% in real terms, with especially large cuts in the national water budget that supported wretched ex-Bantustan towns.
- The much smaller municipal water subsidies, together with the doubling of unemployment in the years after apartheid (thanks to the neoliberal growth, employment and redistribution macroeconomic policies), logically led to much higher non-payment rates for impoverished citizens, and subsequent high rates of disconnection of water supplies.
In an apparent policy U-turn, the world-famous ”free basic water” policy was adopted in July 2001. But even when implemented in larger municipalities — for regrettably it does not exist in most smaller ones — the policy provides just six kilolitres per household per month, no matter the size of the household. After that relatively puny amount, the price rises to excruciating levels.
Consider Durban, where the policy originated. Between 1997 and 2004, the city provided 6kl/month free yet at the same time more than doubled 7+ kl/month water bills. The result was the doubling of the average price of water paid by poor people from R2 to R4/kl over the period. Shockingly, in a city with a high rate of Aids, and acute cholera and other water-related diseases, the poorest third of households lowered their consumption from 22 to 15kl from 1997 to 2004. The Dervis/Manuel water-rights discourse is perhaps less absurd than Manto Tshabalala-Msimang’s vegetable stall at the Toronto Aids conference. But given the neoliberal devils in the details, pricing reform is still long overdue.
Patrick Bond directs the University of KwaZulu-Natal Centre for Civil Society and Greg Ruiters directs the Municipal Services Project at the Rhodes University Institute for Social and Economic Research