There is no water piped to the villages that raised two great presidents of liberated SA, Nelson Mandela and Thabo Mbeki.
Qunu and Ngcingwane, where each grew up, have been without water for two years, ever since their infrastructure was vandalised.
In the village that raised water & sanitation minister Pemmy Majodina, Macacuma in Sterkspruit, there are taps but they are dry.
In Winnie Madikizela-Mandela’s village of Mbhongweni in Mbizana there are neither pipes nor taps.
Villagers yearn for water to flow out taps and roads without life-threatening dongas. They feel abandoned and forgotten.
Mazoko Qwathekani, who arrived in Mbhongweni village in 1983 — and has carried water from the river ever since — said: “Our hopes of getting water died when she [Madikizela-Mandela] died. We have lost hope now.”
In the village of Nkantolo, where OR Tambo, ANC president from 1967-1991, grew up, it is the same — the taps are dry.
The OR Tambo district municipality initially fixed the damage in Qunu, where Mandela was born, at a cost of R200,000, but the vandals struck right back and destroyed it again, a Daily Dispatch special report team was told.
Most of the villagers we talked to during our visit in August were worried their tanks were running dry.
Nontombi Nkunzi, 28, of Qunu has no tank at all.
“I wake up at 4am to get water from the river. If I get there after 8am, I will come home with an empty bucket.”
She has no option but to leave her children alone while she makes this journey.
“It happens sometimes that when I arrive the animals have finished all the water and I have to wait for it to fill again,” she said.
She said the taps had been dry for a long time. No one knew why.
She prays the stream does not dry up. She does not know where else to get water.
Qunu pensioner Nonceba Xozwa, 67, has five tanks.
Three are empty and she is worried the rain won't come.
She said people far away thought living in Mandela’s village meant all was well.
But Nothayimile Nzeki said the situation in Qunu became dire after Mandela died.
She is 73 now, and simply not strong enough to carry a full bucket on her head.
“Because I use a five-litre container I do countless trips to the stream,” she said.
Nzeki has four grandchildren in her care, all under the age of 10.
“They must wash before school and there must be water for cooking.”
A municipal tap sticks out in the yard like a grotesque statue, reminding them all of how their constitutional right to water is ignored.
In Ngcingwane village in Dutywa, where Mbeki grew up, the Dispatch team witnessed the familiar scene of villagers toiling over water in a dirty stream.
They share the water with students from Nomaka Mbeki Technical School who rent rooms in the village.
After filling her 20-litre bucket, pensioner Nosiseko Silo said the handful of taps in the village had run dry years ago.
Mbeki’s historic home is about 300m from the stream.
“Sometimes we find dead animals in the water.
“We have to drag them away and then fill our buckets because we have nowhere else.
“This is the only source of water we have."
To beat the livestock, most villagers get to the stream before day breaks, a dangerous trip in the dark. Armed robbers seeking easy prey are a reality.
“You can get killed here. This stream is far from home."
Nosandla Mthintelwa, 57, said: “We are saved from this water when it rains.
“As I talk to you now I’m still recovering from an upset stomach from drinking this dirty water.
“I come sometimes three times a day with the bucket on my head.
“I am old and my body aches each time. I have to take painkillers — but I need water to take them."
In Macacuma village, Makhotso Pethuka also wakes at 4am to beat the queue.
“Other homes have many tanks. I can’t remember the last time the trucks came. It’s been years since water came out the taps.”
A portrait of Mandela still hangs on a wall in 84-year-old Nongubenyathi Gaga’s two-roomed home.
“We know Majodina is the minister of water & sanitation but she is still new.
“But here and now, we are without hope. We have been promised water so many times.”
Nozamile Mjuleka, 84, of Qungebe village in Nkantolo, said taps were installed in 2019. Suddenly, in August, the flow became erratic.
“Sometimes we have it for two hours and then it is gone for a long time.
“We don’t know why. I’m old now. I can’t carry the bucket on my head.”
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