The War on Leaks programme was announced with fanfare in August 2015 as a bold initiative by the Department of Water and Sanitation (DWS) to address South Africa's chronic water infrastructure crisis. It promised to train 15,000 unemployed young people as plumbers and water agents who would fix the country's leaking pipes. Instead, it became one of the most spectacular examples of how infrastructure fraud can make a crisis worse.
**The Budget Explosion**
The original budget was R2.2 billion — already a substantial commitment for a training and maintenance programme. By the time expenditure was tallied, R4.7 billion had been spent — more than double the original allocation. The R2.5 billion cost overrun was not the result of expanded scope or unexpected challenges. It was the result of systematic fraud.
**The SIU Investigation**
The Special Investigating Unit, authorised by Presidential Proclamation, confirmed what investigators had long suspected:
- **Procurement fraud**: Contracts awarded irregularly through manipulated supply chain processes - **Ghost workers**: People paid for work they did not do, or who did not exist at all - **Non-existent or incomplete work**: Projects certified as complete that were never started or left half-finished - **Overpayments**: Contractors paid far in excess of work actually performed - **Complicit officials**: Government employees who certified fraudulent work as complete
The SIU identified 29 individuals for high-level profiling and suspicious transaction reports. The broader water sector probe found more than R4 billion had flowed to "dodgy water contracts."
**The Damning Metric**
The programme's stated purpose was to reduce water losses. The metric could not be clearer:
- **2015** (programme launch): South Africa lost **35%** of its treated water to leaks - **2025** (after R4.7 billion spent): Water losses had **increased to 47%**
The country spent R4.7 billion — R2.5 billion more than planned — on a programme to fix leaks, and the leaks got worse. Not marginally worse. Twelve percentage points worse. This single statistic encapsulates the fraud: the money was taken, the work was not done, and the infrastructure continued to deteriorate.
**The Ghost Worker Dimension**
Ghost workers in the War on Leaks operated at two levels: 1. **Trainees who didn't exist**: Young people registered as programme participants who never showed up for training 2. **Workers who didn't work**: Individuals registered on project sites who were paid stipends for labour they never performed
In both cases, the payments went to bank accounts controlled by the fraudsters — often with the complicity of DWS officials who certified attendance and work completion.
**The Broader Context**
The War on Leaks fraud occurred within the broader collapse of the Department of Water and Sanitation under Minister Nomvula Mokonyane (2014-2018), who presided over R6 billion in irregular expenditure and the suspension of Blue Drop/Green Drop water quality assessments. The programme was one of several DWS initiatives that became vehicles for extraction rather than service delivery.
The R2.5 billion cost overrun is not merely a financial loss. It represents infrastructure that was not fixed, pipes that continued to leak, communities that continued to go without clean water — all while billions flowed to ghost workers and corrupt contractors.