The national Department of water and sanitation on Tuesday said it was concerned about misinformation that was being peddled on social media about the supposed waste of water from the Theewaterskloof Dam in the Western Cape.
A video has been doing the rounds on social media of an open sluice gate at the dam and water flowing away.
Theewaterskloof is the largest dam supplying the city of Cape Town which is caught in the grips of a severe drought which has seen authorities imposed severe water restrictions in an effort to preserve and stretch the resource as far as possible.
In a statement, the department said: “The sluice gate referred to was not broken, neither was the water being wasted. It is also important to point out that the City of Cape Town is not the only user of water from Theewaterskloof Dam. Irrigators along the Riviersonderend River are entitled to an irrigation allocation from the dam.”
The department added that the releases were however restricted to the curtailed level of 60% of their allocation.
The department added that some of the water released was for abstraction by the Overberg Water Board acting as a sole source of bulk potable water services to towns such as of Caledon within Theewaterskloof Local Municipality, the settlements of Protem and Klipdale in the Cape Agulhas Local Municipality, and drinking and stock-water to farmers in the Ruens veld of the Overberg.
” The releases will cease once the irrigators have taken their full share of the curtailed allocation prior to end of April. Occasional releases may happen if water security for the Overberg Water Board is under severe pressure to supply its users,” the department added.
– African News Agency (ANA),
