After Access: Water Infrastructure, Public Health and the Limits of South Africa’s Post-Apartheid Water Revolution

Water is often thought of as a simple resource: it flows from a source, travels through pipes, and arrives at a tap. For decades, the story of South Africa's water system was told as a triumph of connection. After the end of apartheid in 1994, the new government made it a priority to bring pipes to millions of people who had been denied water by law. They succeeded in extending the network, turning a system built for a few into one that reached the many. But there is a second, quieter story that happens after the pipes are laid. It is the story of keeping those pipes working, clean, and safe every single day. This is the difference between building a road and keeping it paved, or between planting a tree and ensuring it survives the drought.

The challenge of maintaining these systems is not just about fixing broken parts; it is about a continuous, invisible effort to keep water separate from waste. In a healthy system, pipes carry clean water under pressure, and sewers carry waste away, keeping the two worlds apart. When this separation fails, when pipes leak or pressure drops, dirty water can sneak back in, carrying diseases that cause severe illness. The question facing South Africa, and indeed many places around the world, is whether a country can succeed in connecting everyone to water and then fail to keep that water safe.

A recent study by Anthony Kaziboni from the University of Johannesburg investigates exactly this gap. The research looks beyond the simple count of how many households have a tap to ask a harder question: does that tap actually deliver safe, clean water when you turn it on? The author argues that while South Africa achieved a massive "water revolution" by expanding access, it struggled with "infrastructure reproduction." This is a technical way of saying that the country got very good at building new systems but did not invest enough in the daily work of keeping those old systems running. The study suggests that this failure to maintain the system has led to a situation where people have a legal right to water, but the physical reality of that water has become dangerous.

The paper begins by looking at the history of water in the region. Before 1994, water infrastructure was built deliberately to serve white communities and farms while leaving Black communities with little or nothing. When the democratic government took over, it inherited a sophisticated network that was simply not connected to everyone. The new government's task was to extend that existing network to the excluded population. They did this successfully, connecting millions of households. However, the focus on "connecting" created a blind spot. The government and the public celebrated the new connections, but they did not pay enough attention to the work required to keep those connections working. The study calls this the period "after access." It is the time when the excitement of a new pipe fades, and the hard, unglamorous work of maintenance begins.

To understand what happens when maintenance fails, the researcher looks at several key moments in South Africa's recent history. One early warning sign was a cholera outbreak in 2000 and 2001 in the KwaZulu-Natal province. At that time, a local authority stopped providing free water to a poor settlement and tried to charge for it. The residents, unable to pay, turned to an unsafe, contaminated water source, and the disease spread. This event showed that even when a government tries to manage water, if the service is interrupted or made too expensive for the poorest people, the public health consequences can be deadly. It was a sign that the system was fragile, even before the full expansion of pipes was complete.

As the years passed, the country developed tools to measure how well its water systems were working. They created three main reports: one to check if drinking water was clean, one to check if wastewater was treated properly, and one to measure how much water was lost to leaks. The data from these reports tells a worrying story. Over time, the number of water systems that met safety standards has dropped. A significant portion of the country's wastewater treatment plants are now in a critical condition, meaning they are not cleaning the water as they should. Furthermore, nearly half of all the water that is treated is lost before it reaches a home, either through leaks or theft. This lost water is not just a financial problem; it is a health problem. When pipes leak or water pressure drops, dirty water from the soil can be sucked back into the clean pipes, contaminating the supply right before it reaches the tap.

The study also brings in the voices of people living with these failing systems. In three communities in the Madibeng area, residents described water that would stop for days or even months at a time. When the water finally returned, they said it was often brown or dirty. They spoke of family members getting sick with stomach problems after drinking the tap water. These are not just complaints about inconvenience; they are reports of a system that has become unreliable. The residents feel a sense of abandonment, as if the government built the pipes and then walked away. They describe a condition where they cannot trust the water, even though they have a legal right to it.

The pandemic of 2020 provided a stark test of this situation. When the virus arrived, health officials told everyone to wash their hands frequently to stay safe. This advice assumed that every household had a steady supply of water. But for many South Africans, water was not steady. It came and went. In some areas, the government had to send out trucks to deliver water in tanks, but even this emergency effort was plagued by problems. The trucks were not delivered as promised, and the data on where they went was confusing. This moment revealed a deep gap: the government had the legal framework to provide water, but it did not have the practical ability to deliver it continuously when it was needed most.

The most recent and severe example of this breakdown occurred in 2023 in Hammanskraal, a settlement near Pretoria. An outbreak of cholera, a disease that is usually a sign of poor water and sanitation, killed people and sickened hundreds. The investigation into this outbreak found that the local wastewater treatment plant was overloaded and not working correctly. It was pumping dirty water into the river that supplied the town's drinking water. While investigators could not pinpoint a single exact cause for every case of illness, they found that the water in the taps was contaminated with bacteria that should not be there. The system had failed to keep the clean water separate from the waste. The government responded with a plan to fix the plant, but the event served as a clear warning: the infrastructure that was built decades ago was now breaking down, and the people relying on it were paying the price with their health.

The author argues that this is not a story of a government that failed to build, nor is it a story of simple corruption. Instead, it is a story of a political and economic system that rewards building new things but does not reward keeping old things working. It is easier for politicians to cut a ribbon on a new pipe than to fund the daily repairs of an old one. The money needed to fix leaks and maintain treatment plants is often not available, especially in poorer areas where the people cannot afford to pay high water bills. This creates a vicious cycle: the water becomes dirty and unreliable, so people stop paying their bills, which leaves even less money to fix the system.

The study concludes that South Africa's water history has moved through distinct stages. First, there was the era of racial exclusion, where water was denied to many. Then came the era of rights-based expansion, where the government successfully connected millions of new households. Now, the country faces a new and difficult challenge: the era of infrastructure reproduction. This is the ongoing work of keeping the system alive. The research suggests that without a major shift in how the country values and funds this maintenance, the public health gains made over the last thirty years are at risk. The pipes are there, and the taps are connected, but the water flowing from them is no longer guaranteed to be safe. This is a lesson that extends far beyond South Africa. As water systems around the world age and face new pressures, the question is no longer just about how to build them, but how to keep them working for the people who depend on them.