Every day taps open throughout eThekwini Municipality and water from Inanda Dam quenches the thirst of millions of people. Ironically, the communities who once lived next to the Mgeni River, who were displaced by Inanda Dam, are still waiting — 20 years later — for their livelihood and their lives to be restored.
For Maxwell Meyiwa — the representative of the Ngcolosi — who was displaced to Tin Town, KwaDinabakubo, the wait was too long. He died this week after campaigning for many years for the rights of his community.
In December 1999 he made a submission to the World Commission on Dams, a global evaluation of large dams chaired by the then-minister of water affairs and forestry, Kader Asmal. The commission concluded that although dams had brought considerable benefits, in too many cases the costs — environmentally, socially and economically — were unacceptable and avoidable and made a strong case for remedying outstanding social issues of the past.
In the case of Inanda Dam the social cost has been unacceptable despite post-apartheid political interventions. For the people of this area there have been variations on the theme of promises being broken again and again.
Inanda Dam was planned in the 1970s. Construction started in the the 1980s. One of the communities affected — the AmaQadi — was moved into temporary housing in 1986.
The other two communities had not moved yet. Despite the near completion of the dam wall, heavy rains filled the reservoir unexpectedly on September 27 1987. The communities of Mphepheteni and Ngcolosi had to run away from the rising waters that destroyed their homes. One of the children of the Mphepheteni died in the floods.
Meyiwa’s community, the Ngcolosi, were moved up the hill into KwaDinabakubo into temporary tin shacks. Twenty years later many of the community are still in these shacks that are ‘terribly hot in summer and terribly cold in winterâ€, says Jabulani Msomi, one of the elders of KwaDinabakubo.
Ronnie Kasrils, then-minister of water affairs and forestry, visited the community in 2003. He was horrified by the conditions under which people were living and established the Inanda Dam Reparations Forum under the auspices of eThekwini Municipality. The department of water affairs and forestry supported this initiative.
Three years later the forum has achieved little, say community representatives. The three communities are frustrated, their hope is waning and people are dying.
Justine Shangazi, who campaigned for the Mphepheteni, asked: ‘Will I see justice before I die?†The answer was no. She has died. Jabu Mahlaba, who was interviewed in April, and who spoke about the Inanda Dam demolishing all her possessions and taking away her land and livestock, died two weeks ago.
President Thabo Mbeki visited the area in 2003 when he celebrated the achievement of providing nine million people with water. In his official speech he stated: ‘ [In 1987] a huge water reservoir, the Inanda Dam, was built on your land. You were forced to move to make way for a dam, while others, more privileged than you, could drink every running drop of that precious water.â€
This gave the communities hope that, if the president knew about the situation, it might be resolved. That was 2003. That same year the South African Multi-stakeholder Initiative on the World Commission on Dams, an initiative aimed at applying the commission’s recommendations in South Africa, held its annual meeting in the Umgeni Valley. More than 100 delegates — made up of members of government, the private sector and civil society — visited the tin houses of KwaDinabakubo and saw the conditions under which the community had been living for 20 years, while eThekwini has continued to enjoy the supply of fresh water from the dam.
The commission highlighted the issue of ‘benefit sharingâ€, recommending that those affected by large dams should be first in line to benefit.
In China the concept is used to remedy outstanding social issues. If a percentage of the revenue generated by the waters of Inanda Dam was to be allocated to the restitution of the livelihoods of communities affected by Inanda Dam, the whole issue of bureaucratic accountability, the old South Africa versus the new South Africa, could be circumvented.
This would take a real commitment to achieving justice, with a negotiated tariff increase between Umgeni Water, which controls the dam and sells the water to eThekwini Municipality, which provides the people of eThekwini with the life-giving water.
Liane Greeff is a member of the Environmental Monitoring Group and is on the committee of the South African Multi-Stakeholder Initiative on the World Commission on Dams