Mayor Nasiphi Moya insists Tshwane’s water tanker spending figures were misrepresented and blames past leadership for inflated costs.
City of Tshwane mayor Nasiphi Moya said the city’s response was not creative accounting; but rather correcting a deliberately constructed false narrative
“Let me be clear: water tanker expenditure in Tshwane is high.
“I have never disputed that. That is precisely why, since my election in October 2024, I have prioritised a series of reforms to reduce it.
Moya disagrees that city’s explanation didn’t hold water
“These interventions form part of a broader shift from emergency water supply toward long-term water security,” she said in response to reaction to the city’s explanation on water tankers in the capital.
Moya said she disagreed with the comments made by WaterCAN’s Ferrial Adam, suggesting that the city’s explanation for its water tanker expenditure didn’t hold water.
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“While I respect the role of civil society organisations in holding government to account, it becomes troubling when commentary presented as expert analysis begins to echo political talking points.”
Moya said Adam’s comparison with the previous administration was designed to make its record look better and to move from technical observation to political judgment.
Moya said the R777 million figure was drawn from a system snapshot that included cancelled, duplicated and unprocessed purchase orders, not actual payments.
R777m not actual payments – mayor
“Verified records from group finance confirm total payments of R621 million in 2024-25, of which R179.9 million were unpaid invoices from 2023-24, when Cilliers Brink was the mayor.
“Once those are correctly allocated to 2023-24, the actual expenditure for 2024-25 is R441.1 million, of which about R98 million occurred before Brink was removed from office,” she said.
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Moya said properly attributing these costs to the financial year in which they were incurred was not creative accounting.
She said it was about correcting a deliberately constructed false narrative that had been used to unfairly attack the current administration.
“The truth is that between June 2023 and October 2024, executive mayor Brink presided over approximately R419 million in water tanker expenditure, whether those invoices were processed at the time or not.”