After years of unsafe water and broken promises, the community north of Pretoria is close to receiving reliable drinking water from an expanded Klipdrift treatment works. The work is late, but it is real.
Few places have come to symbolise South Africa’s water crisis as powerfully as Hammanskraal. The community on Tshwane’s northern edge spent years with tap water that residents described as brown and foul-smelling, and in May 2023 the deaths of more than 20 people in a cholera outbreak turned a long-running local failure into a national scandal. The source of much of the trouble was the overloaded Rooiwal wastewater treatment works, whose poorly treated effluent flowed into the Apies River and from there towards the community’s drinking water source.
Nearly three years later, there is genuine progress to report. At a review meeting on 13 January 2026, the Department of Water and Sanitation, its entity Magalies Water, the City of Tshwane and the Gauteng provincial government heard that the new package plant at the Klipdrift water treatment works was about 88 percent complete, with clean water from its first two modules already fit for human consumption.
Doubling the supply of clean water
The heart of the project is a four-module, 50 megalitre package plant built alongside the existing Klipdrift works. When it is complete, the works will be able to produce about 92 megalitres of treated water a day, up from 42 megalitres before the expansion. Of that total, 50 megalitres a day is earmarked for the City of Tshwane to distribute to Hammanskraal and surrounding areas.
The main outstanding task is the conveyance system. Pump sets still need to be completed before water can reach communities that do not yet have potable water at their taps, and the department has set a target of about four months for that work. Areas such as Mandela Village, Marokolong, Ramotse, Kekana Gardens, Babelegi Industrial, several Kudube units and Majaneng Moshate already receive water from Klipdrift, but population growth has meant that supply is intermittent, especially in higher-lying areas. System optimisation and demand management measures are being introduced to spread the available water more evenly.
Fixing the source of the problem
Clean water at the tap is only half of the story. The other half is Rooiwal, the wastewater works that for years discharged inadequately treated sewage into the Apies River. Rehabilitation of Rooiwal is under way, with the aim of bringing its effluent into line with the standards required to protect the river. That matters not only for Hammanskraal but for every community, farm and ecosystem downstream along the Apies and Pienaars rivers, the very catchments where the MAP Forum began its work.
The Rooiwal problem is a reminder that drinking water and wastewater cannot be solved separately. A town can build the best treatment plant in the world, but if the river it draws from is full of sewage, the plant will struggle and the cost of treatment will keep rising.
Late, but moving
The project has not been smooth. It has faced repeated delays, and residents have been told more than once that clean water was just around the corner. At the January meeting, Minister Pemmy Majodina, Deputy Minister David Mahlobo, Gauteng MEC Jacob Mamabolo and Tshwane Executive Mayor Nasiphi Moya reviewed an acceleration plan for the remaining work. Technical teams will now meet weekly and the political leadership every two weeks until the project is finished. Tshwane has also prepared plans to manage any shortfall in demand beyond what Klipdrift can supply.
That level of political attention is unusual and important. One reason Hammanskraal languished for so long was that responsibility was split between a municipality without the money or capacity to fix Rooiwal, a province with limited powers and a national department reluctant to step in. The current intervention brings all three together, alongside a bulk water utility with technical expertise.
Why this is good news
It would be easy to treat Hammanskraal as just another story of delay. But the facts show something different. Clean water from new modules is already being produced and found fit to drink. Treatment capacity is more than doubling. The wastewater works that caused the problem is being rehabilitated. And government has committed to a clear structure of accountability until the job is done.
The department has asked residents to use the available water sparingly while the final work is completed, and the real test will be whether every household in the area receives reliable, safe water within the promised months. For a community that has waited so long, that is the only measure that counts. But for the first time in years, the end of Hammanskraal’s water crisis is genuinely in sight, and that is worth reporting.
References
Engineering News: Despite delays, Hammanskraal water project makes progress (16 January 2026): https://www.engineeringnews.co.za/article/despite-delays-hammanskraal-water-project-progress-2026-01-16
SAnews: Cabinet updated on Hammanskraal Clean Water Project: https://www.sanews.gov.za/south-africa/cabinet-updated-hammanskraal-clean-water-project
Engineering News: Rooiwal set for R4bn upgrade, DBSA selected as implementing agent (1 June 2023): https://www.engineeringnews.co.za/article/rooiwal-set-for-r4bn-upgrade-dbsa-selected-as-implementing-agent-2023-06-01
EWN: Tshwane mayor on Rooiwal plant upgrade timelines (30 December 2024): https://www.ewn.co.za/it-s-going-very-well-tshwane-mayor-on-rooiwal-plant-upgrade-timelines/
Department of Water and Sanitation: Media advisories 2025, Hammanskraal Module 2 handover: https://www.dws.gov.za/mediaA2025.aspx