Water supply has emerged as a defining issue in the coming local government election, which will be held in November. While much of the public conversation has focussed on the failure of water infrastructure, less has been made of the flip side: the use of water tankers to fill in for degraded pipes.

New research argues that this has become a measure that is ultimately working against proper solutions.

Dr Nyashadzashe Chiwawa of the University of KwaZulu-Natal said: “Water tankers have shifted from being an emergency stopgap to a routine feature of water provision by municipalities. In many communities, especially informal settlements and areas affected by repeated outages, residents now depend on trucks to deliver water for months at a time.”

Many of the country’s water systems have seen a decade or more of decay, with pipes and pumping systems not being maintained or repaired, meaning that that taps – particularly in informal settlements – often run dry or become unserviceable.

This has created a lucrative market. Johannesburg Water spent some R130.5 million on tanker services in 2024/25. This has become a recurring expenditure, and represents an outlay that might otherwise be used for capital expenditure.

Water tankers have also become a subject of controversy for the allegedly crooked award of contracts. (One such contract, worth around R263 million, was set aside by the courts in December last year).

Dr Chiwawa continues: “South Africa’s growing reliance on water tankers reflects a deepening collapse in municipal water systems. A 2023 government report found that 46% of water supply systems in the country had poor or bad microbiological water quality, compared with only 5% in 2014. Water lost through leaks, faulty meters, illegal connections, poor billing or uncollected revenue rose from 37% in 2014 to 47% in 2023. This is far above the international average of about 30%. By 2025, 47% of audited wastewater treatment systems were in a critical state, up from 39% in the previous assessment. Water systems rated excellent or good fell from 14% to 8%. Together, these reports point to a long-running deterioration in municipal capacity: infrastructure is ageing, maintenance budgets are inadequate, skilled staff are in short supply, and many municipalities are losing treated water faster than they can reliably deliver it.”

His research, focused on the eThekwini (Durban) metro, found that “tankering” interventions were ultimately becoming harmful. Deliveries were often erratic. Real solutions to the problem were delayed, while the lack of services and the manner in which the tanker services were engaged were profoundly alienating.

Dr Chiwawa’s analysis echoes what other researchers and activists have been claiming.

“Tankering” is also linked to extortion networks – the so-called “water-tanker mafias” – who have benefitted from corrupt access to contracts while infrastructure is failing, and sometimes actively contribute to sabotaging the formal water supply to ensure that the business keeps coming. The Minister of Water and Sanitation, Pemmy Majodina, conceded this in Parliament. She added, though, that the responsibility for dealing with this rested with municipalities, rather than with local water service authorities.

It is, however, largely at the local level that criminal groups and corrupt officials interact.