Background Appendices

Appendix A: South African Legislation

Water Provisions within the Bill of Rights (RSA, 1996)

Section 27. Health care, food, water and social security

1. Everyone has the right to have access to ­
   1. health care services, including reproductive health care;
   2. sufficient food and water; and
   3. social security, including, if they are unable to support themselves and their dependants, appropriate social assistance.
2. The state must take reasonable legislative and other measures, within its available resources, to achieve the progressive realisation of each of these rights.
3. No one may be refused emergency medical treatment.

National Environmental Management Act (NEMA) of 1998: Preamble (City of Cape Town: ERM, 2009) 

ACT

To provide for co-operative environmental governance by establishing principles

for decision-making on matters affecting the environment, institutions that will

promote co-operative governance and procedures for co-ordinating environmental

functions exercised by organs of state; and to provide for matters connected

therewith.

 

PREAMBLE

WHEREAS many inhabitants of South Africa live in an environment that is harmful to

their health and well-being;

everyone has the right to an environment that is not harmful to his or her health or

well-being;

the State must respect, protect, promote and fulfil the social, economic and

environmental rights of everyone and strive to meet the basic needs of previously

disadvantaged communities;

inequality in the distribution of wealth and resources, and the resultant poverty, are

among the important causes as well as the results of environmentally harmful practices;

sustainable development requires the integration of social, economic and environmental

factors in the planning, implementation and evaluation of decisions to ensure that

development serves present and future generations;

everyone has the right to have the environment protected, for the benefit of present and

future generations, through reasonable legislative and other measures that—

prevent pollution and ecological degradation;

promote conservation; and

secure ecologically sustainable development and use of natural resources while

promoting justifiable economic and social development;

the environment is a functional area of concurrent national and provincial legislative

competence, and all spheres of government and all organs of state must co-operate with,

consult and support one another;

AND WHEREAS it is desirable—

that the law develops a framework for integrating good environmental management

into all development activities;

that the law should promote certainty with regard to decision-making by organs of

state on matters affecting the environment;

that the law should establish principles guiding the exercise of functions affecting

the environment;

that the law should ensure that organs of state maintain the principles guiding the

exercise of functions affecting the environment;

that the law should establish procedures and institutions to facilitate and promote

co-operative government and intergovernmental relations;

that the law should establish procedures and institutions to facilitate and promote

public participation in environmental governance;

that the law should be enforced by the State and that the law should facilitate the

enforcement of environmental laws by civil society;

Water Services Act (WSA) of 1997: Preamble (DWEA, 2009)

ACT

To provide for the rights of access to basic water supply and basic sanitation; to

provide for the setting of national standards and of norms and standards for

tariffs; to provide for water services development plans; to provide a regulatory

framework for water services institutions and water services intermediaries; to

provide for the establishment and disestablishment of water boards and water

services committees and their powers and duties; to provide for the monitoring of

water services and intervention by the Minister or by the relevant Province; to

provide for financial assistance to water services institutions; to provide for certain

general powers of the Minister; to provide for the gathering of information in a

national information system and the distribution of that information; to repeal

certain laws; and to provide for matters connected therewith.

 

PREAMBLE

RECOGNIZING the rights of access to basic water supply and basic sanitation

necessary to ensure sufficient water and an environment not harmful to health or

well-being;

ACKNOWLEDGING that there is a duty on all spheres of Government to ensure that

water supply services and sanitation services are provided in a manner which is efficient,

equitable and sustainable;

ACKNOWLEDGING that all spheres of Government must strive to provide water

supply services and sanitation services sufficient for subsistence and sustainable

economic activity;

RECOGNIZING that in striving to provide water supply services and sanitation

services, all spheres of Government must observe and adhere to the principles of

co-operative government;

ACKNOWLEDGING that although municipalities have authority to administer water

supply services and sanitation services, all spheres of Government have a duty, within

the limits of physical and financial feasibility, to work towards this object;

RECOGNIZING that the provision of water supply services and sanitation services,

although an activity distinct from the overall management of water resources, must be

undertaken in a manner consistent with the broader goals of water resource

management;

RECOGNIZING that water supply services and sanitation services are often provided

in monopolistic or near monopolistic circumstances and that the interests of consumers

and the broader goals of public policy must be promoted; and

CONFIRMING the National Government’s role as custodian of the nation’s water

resources;

National Water Act (NWA) of 1998: Preamble (City of Cape Town: ERM, 2009)

ACT

10 provide for fundamental reform of the law relating to water resources; to repeal

certain laws; and to provide for matters connected therewith.

 

PREAMBLE

Recognizing that water is a scarce and unevenly distributed national resource which

occurs in many different forms which are all part of a unitary, inter-dependent cycle;

Recognizing that while water is a natural resource that belongs to all people, the

discriminatory laws and practices of the past have prevented equal access to water, and

use of water resources;

Acknowledging the National Government’s overall responsibility for and authority

over the nation’s water resources and their use, including the equitable allocation of

water for beneficial use, the redistribution of water, and international water matters;

Recognizing that the ultimate aim of water resource management is to achieve the

sustainable use of water for the benefit of all users;

Recognizing that the protection of the quality of water resources is necessary to

ensure sustainability of the nation’s water resources in the interests of all water users;

and

Recognizing the need for the integrated management of all aspects of water resources

and, where appropriate, the delegation of management functions to a regional or

catchment level so as to enable everyone to participate;

 

Municipal Systems Act of 2000: Preamble (City of Cape Town: ERM, 2009)

ACT

To provide for the core principles, mechanisms and processes that are necessary to

enable municipalities to move progressively towards the social and economic

upliftment of local communities, and ensure universal access to essential services

that are affordable to all; to define the legal nature of a municipality as including

the local community within the municipal area, working in partnership with the

municipality’s political and administrative structures; to provide for the manner in

which municipal powers and functions are exercised and performed; to provide for

community participation; to establish a simple and enabling framework for the

core processes of planning, performance management, resource mobilisation and

organisational change which underpin the notion of developmental local government;

to provide a framework for local public administration and human resource

development; to empower the poor and ensure that municipalities put in place

service tariffs and credit control policies that take their needs into account by

providing a framework for the provision of services, service delivery agreements

and municipal service districts; to provide for credit control and debt collection; to

establish a framework for support,, monitoring and standard setting by other

spheres of government in order to progressively build local government into an

efficient, frontline development agency capable of integrating the activities of all

spheres of government for the overall social and economic upliftment of

communities in harmony with their local natural environment; to provide for legal

matters pertaining to local government; and to provide for matters incidental

thereto.

 

PREAMBLE

Whereas the system of local government under apartheid failed dismally to meet the

basic needs of the majority of South Africans;

Whereas the Constitution of our non-racial democracy enjoins local government not just

to seek to provide services to all our people but to be fundamentally developmental in

orientation;

Whereas there is a need to set out the core principles, mechanisms and processes that

give meaning to developmental local government and to empower municipalities to

move progressively towards the social and economic upliftment of communities and the

provision of basic services to all our people, and specifically the poor and the

disadvantaged;

Whereas a fundamental aspect of the new local government system is the active

engagement of communities in the affairs of municipalities of which they are an integral

part, and in particular in planning, service delivery and performance management;

Whereas the new system of local government requires an efficient, effective and

transparent local public administration that conforms to constitutional principles;

Whereas there is a need to ensure financially and economically viable municipalities;

Whereas there is a need to create a more harmonious relationship between municipal

councils, municipal administrations and the local communities through the

acknowledgement of reciprocal rights and duties;

Whereas there is a need to develop a strong system of local government capable of

exercising the functions and powers assigned to it; and

Whereas this Act is an integral part of a suite of legislation that gives effect to the new

system of local government;