Lepelle Northern Water, an implementing agent for the national department of water affairs and sanitation and the province’s water affairs department, recently received praise for successfully managing the chronic water shortage in Limpopo.

LIMPOPO – LEPELLE Northern Water, an implementing agent for the national department of water affairs and sanitation and the province’s water affairs department, recently received praise from the portfolio committee on water and sanitation in national parliament in Cape Town over the weekend.

Lepelle has changed the lives of nearly one million Limpopo residents for the better, while the local water affairs department was praised for successfully managing the chronic water shortage in Limpopo.

The committee visited the poverty stricken and disaster declared area of Mopani and Vhembe region last Thursday and Friday respectively.

The visit was aimed at checking progress made since the visit by president Jacob Zuma and followed by water affairs and sanitation minister, Nomvula Mokonyane in August this year.

According to Mopani mayor, Nkakareng Rakgoale, Mopani was the third largest region in Limpopo after Vhembe and Capricorn, with a population of just over 1 million people. Rakgoale said the region comprised five local municipalities, being Greater Tzaneen, Giyani, Letaba, Ba-Phalaborwa and Maruleng.

The national department moved the responsibility of being the water authority from Mopani Municipality to Lepelle on August 28 last year in order to regularise water and sanitation services in the region. The move was taken after several boreholes drilled by the municipality where allegedly found to be dysfunctional.

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