Johannesburg - The Department of Roads and Transport has announced that the Maponya Mall licensing centre in Soweto will be closed for two days due to a lack of water supply.
The department reported that as a result of Rand Water's scheduled maintenance, the licensing centre would be closed Wednesday and Thursday due to the unavailability of water.
Due to the shutdown, all direct feeds from Rand Water have been affected, impacting the Roodepoort, Central, and Soweto areas.
Rand Water's planned maintenance project forms part of the water utility's refurbishment and upgrading of its infrastructure to ensure future sustainability.
Through a statement, the utility said they planned to tie in two valves between the A19 and B14 Pipelines, with work undertaken to replace multiple valves at the Vereeniging Water Treatment Plant, Eikenhof Booster Pumping Station, and Zuikerbosch Water Treatment Plant.
The department said that the centre was expected to resume its services on Friday.
Despite the announcement, some residents voiced dissatisfaction with the lack of water supply in certain areas in the days before the shutdown, which they alleged made it difficult to prepare and stock up on water.
According to other reports, Rand Water has urged Gauteng residents not to panic over the planned water outage.
Spokesperson Makenosi Maroo stressed that all affected municipalities were given notice to put contingency plans in place and fill their reservoirs.
Maroo said: "I think we need to be very cautious. I realise that people are panicking that they'll not have water for 10 days. When we say the system needs time to recover, it doesn't mean that there won't be water at all.
"So there'll still be water trickling once we're done with the maintenance, but the system will take about 10 days to fully recover. We have informed the municipalities who are customers in this case and have given them 21 days in advance for them to prepare in case people don't have water so that they can be able to dispense water tankers and fill up their water reservoirs in the meantime."
The Star