Millions of litres of water are being unlawfully diverted into dams set up by South Africa's major industries, big mining companies and commercial farmers - with potentially devastating consequences for management of the resource.

Several rivers run through South Africa into neighbouring Lesotho, Namibia, Botswana Zimbabwe, and Mozambique - and international treaties stipulate that a certain amount of water must flow through each river system, says Nigel Adams, head of the Blue Scorpions, the investigative task force of South Africa's water and environmental affairs department.

The Blue Scorpions have started probing the electricity accounts of alleged culprits, and using satellite photographs in a bid to stamp out unauthorised water use. The Blue Scorpions also boat up major rivers every three months, making unscheduled visits to commercial farms, mines and factories.

Adams told IPS that he is investigating 500 cases, ranging from farmers who divert rivers into home made dams; to sand-mining companies who build roads across rivers without asking permission, in order to get to the sand; to mines who pollute rivers with acid drainage, making water downstream unfit for agricultural or human use.

He also describes a case where a farmer, who he declined to name, built agricultural buildings in the middle of a wetland; and another group of farmers from Pongola, in KwaZulu-Natal province, who refused to pay their $7.6 million water bill until the Blue Scorpions intervened with criminal charges.

But swoops by the Blue Scorpions have sparked a war of words between commercial farmers and mining companies, with commercial farmers accusing the Blue Scorpions of failing to crack down on the mines for fear of legal action.

Koos Pretorius, a commercial cherry farmer from Belfast, in Mpumalanga province, told IPS that the Blue Scorpions are "coming down hard on the farmers, believing us to be soft targets".

"They know the mines will go straight to the lawyers, but they think the farmers are not capable of taking them to court," Pretorius says.

Article Continues: IPS