Stakeholders ’ Participation in Water Management : A Case Study of the Msunduzi Catchment Management Forum of KwaZulu-Natal , South Africa

Public participation is widely accepted as a critical component of managing water resources in South Africa; hence it is strongly emphasized in the South African National Water Act. Although the importance of an enabling legislation and policy on public participation is highly appreciated; this is not sufficient enough to support meaningful participation of the public, particularly those from disadvantaged communities. This study was therefore aimed at investigating the extent of participation of previously disadvantaged communities in water management. To achieve this objective, the study employed a qualitative approach that involved the use of primary and secondary data sources. The results obtained revealed the lack of meaningful participation by disadvantaged communities in water management decisions. This is because the majority of individuals that may have interest in water resource management are excluded in such decisions at the community level. It was also observed that the organizations that attended the forum do not interact with their community, hence did not serve as intermediaries between the South African Department of Water Affairs (DWA) and their communities. The reliance of the DWA on community organizations in catchment is ineffective. In addition, the few participants from disadvantaged communities who are part of the forum do not understand the technical nature of information presented. It is therefore important that more emphasis be placed on the development of skills and capacity of participants to understand and make meaningful contributions, especially those from the disadvantaged communities.


Introduction
The democratic imperative of South Africa's emerging democracy demands that the public be involved in issues that affect them with channels for participation set up for a host of different issues and sectors of society.One such channel of participation is the Catchment Management Forums (CMF).According the South African National Water Act, a CMF is a non-statutory water management institution, which is to assist in the setting up of statutory water management institutions.These forums were set up to address the issue of citizen participation in water resource management at the grassroots level (du Toit & Pollard, 2008;Lotz-Sisitka & Burt, 2006;James, 2003;Karar, 2003).In South Africa, public participation in water resource management has been identified as critical in providing opportunities for water management institutions to share ideas with local communities, which is one of the basic pillars of integrated water resource management adopted by the country (du Toit & Pollard, 2008;Lotz-Sisitka & Burt, 2006;Anderson, 2005;Faysse, 2004).Historically, water management in South Africa has been characterized by central planning and delivery-oriented management, which largely ignored the interest of majority of stakeholders.Integrated water resource management which requires the active participation of citizens was adopted to address the deficiency of the historical management by ensuring consensus building on issues affecting people living in a particular water management area.
The South African Department of Water Affairs (DWA) foresee the CMF as a means through which "bottom-up" involvement of local stakeholders and awareness creation can take place (DWA, 2002).This is because the CMF serves as medium for stakeholders to become aware of each other's perspective on issues at their local water management area by creating the institutional environment at the local level to facilitate discussions.A catchment management forum therefore serves as both a communication channel and watch dog for problem identification and communication to the responsible government department or authority.Water management at the local level through the CMF is also to ensure that local relevance and contextualization of appropriate management strategies take place.This is based on the premise that, local stakeholders are better placed in identifying the problems based on the current and relevant information and also contextualize appropriate solutions (du Toit et al., 2011).In addition, local management ensures greater opportunities for the integration of water management with other local planning and development initiatives.
The South African National Water Act (NWA, 1998) calls for the mandatory inclusion of previously disadvantaged and marginalized groups in the CMF.This mandatory inclusion is seen as critical in achieving the goals of water management institutions, such as water conservation, management and monitoring.The legislation is also aimed at addressing the past alienation of citizens in decision-making, hence gives equal rights to all citizens, as enshrined in the country's Constitution (Act 108 of 1996).Despite this mandate, concerns have been raised with the fact that most policies and legislation on public participation processes in South Africa are silent on how best public involvement can be achieved.The case of the CMF is not an exception.Also, little emphasis is placed on the capacity of participants and how they feel about public participation processes (du Toit, 2005;Faysse, 2004).This indicates that the setting up institutional platforms, as well as legal reforms for participation does not necessarily ensure that meaningful participation of stakeholders truly takes place.This study was therefore aimed at investigating the extent of participation of previously disadvantaged communities in CMF in South Africa, using the Msunduzi Catchment Management Forum of Kwazulu-Natal as a case study.

Methodology
This study was conducted in the Msunduzi Municipality, in the KwaZulu-Natal Province of South Africa.The Msunduzi river catchment covers an area of 540 km 2 , with most of the people living in the catchment coming from the previously disadvantaged and marginalized communities and lacking understanding of environmental and development issues (Rivers-Moore & Hay, 2002).
The study relied on multi research data collection methods that involved the use of primary (semi-structured interviews) and secondary data sources.The secondary data sources include minutes of catchment management forums, internal reports by the Department of Water Affairs (DWA), policy guidelines and memoranda on CMF and published literatures on public participation.A semi-structured interview was used to obtain information from participants.The interviews were tape-recorded and transcribed verbatim with permission from the participants.The recordings provided the opportunity for attentive listening to the interviewee and also for further verification of statements from respondents when necessary during data analysis.The responses of participants who declined the recording were handwritten.
The sampling method for the study was purposeful, with only those who have attended or attending CMF included in the study.All respondents were selected from the lists of all participants who attend CMF that was obtained from DWA.The attendance of CMF was observed to be poor, which then influenced the total population from which the sample was drawn.A total of 19 participants (made up members of organizations from the disadvantaged communities, advantaged NGOs, company, municipality and DWA) were interviewed.
After the interview transcripts were generated, significant themes from the participants' statements were identified and presented in illustrative quotes and used for discussion as suggested by Soneryd (2004).

Results and Discussion
The analysis and discussion of this study is accompanied by applicable question from the interviews and quotations from the interview transcripts of respondents.Based on the questions, which were designed to answer the objectives of the study, the themes from respondents' statements were categorized into four.
Expectation of participants: Historically, the DWA has had minimal relationships with the general public and its support for public participation emerged as a result of the new democratic principle in South Africa, which has made it obligatory to involve the public in its deliberations.This minimal contact has created a gap in expectations between what the DWA can do and what participants expects from the forum.The lack of clarity about the functions of CMF was evident from the views expressed by the disadvantaged community representatives.To determine the extent of familiarization with the objectives of the CMF, respondents were asked on how they perceive the impact of their contribution on decision-making in the forum.The following quotes capture some of the feelings of respondents: "When we go to meetings whatever we say we don't see any changes and they (DWA) don't come to check whether what you (we) said is true or false" "What I can say is that my views are not taken in the decision making process because things always remain the same"

"I must say my contribution does not affect the decision making because you (I) don't see any change"
There is often a considerable gap between expectations and opportunities that a participation process can provide, which calls for the clarification of goals to participants about what they can achieve in participation process (Environmental Protection Agency-EPA, 2000).Based on the legal status of water management institutions described by Karar (2003), the CMF can be classified as tokenism under Arnstein's (1969) ladder of public participation, whereby the organizers are not obliged to implement the views of participants.Participants concerns that their views are not taken into consideration can be attributed to their lack of awareness that the CMF is a non-statutory decision-making water management institution.According to du Toit ( 2005), there are generally unrealistic expectations among participants in a public participation process in South Africa, which may be due to poor public awareness campaigns.In addition, the current democratic dispensation, which has portrayed government as responsible for all socio-economic issues, has created the impression among citizens that their views as expressed in a public participation process should be implemented.
It is generally reported that community expectations from public participation processes and organisations are undergoing significant changes in recent years.For example, in the 1950's, people were more tolerant of poor services; more patiently waiting in long queues and enduring inefficient public administration than they are now.In recent years, public participation is seen as both morally and functionally integral to basic fundamental democratic values, such as government accountability and legitimacy, political equality and social responsibility among citizens.This new pattern of rising expectations of public sector delivery, though not only unique to South Africa, has indeed strongly influenced domestic municipal reform initiatives (CTPID, 2001;Olivier, 2006).In this, context, a public participation process is expected to serve three basic functions: ensuring the responsiveness and accountability of government to her citizens; creating forum for groups and individuals to enhance their competence and capacity to influence decisions that concerns them; and the strengthening of the social fabric of communities, through the creation of opportunities for learning and development of interpersonal relationships and mutual understanding (CTPID, 2001).
As observed in this study, the gap between expectations and what the forum can deliver could be attributed to the lack of proper evaluation by the DWA on the level of satisfaction of participants in the CMF.According to Chranley and Engelbert (2005), organizers of a public participation process should have methods and tools for the evaluation of such processes.This is because, without evaluation, there will be no way of knowing how to improve the process.It is opined that most evaluations of participation processes do not receive enough attention.This is because, such evaluations are only done internally for perceived success and/or problem, hence focusing on whether the methods used in a particular exercise worked.Although this is reported to be fine, as long as indicators for what counts as 'working' were developed beforehand on the basis of expectations of all parties involved, this is rarely the case, or evaluation is done in an ad hoc manner, where little methodological rigour is devoted to data collection and analysis (European Institute for Public Participation, 2008).It is vital for managers of a participation process to properly plan consider what kind of system they can set up to monitor and finally evaluate the participation process from the onset of the process.This will assist them to continuously improve the process during its implementation and also learn something about the appropriateness of the process as a whole (von Korff et al., 2010).
Inclusiveness: One objective of the South African National Water Act of 1998 is to ensure the inclusiveness of participants who have interest or have been affected by issues to be discussed.According to Khan (2012), participatory democracy, which strives for the involvement of all citizens, is seen as the means of giving people; especially those at the grassroots level, a voice in decision-making in South Africa.However, participation process cannot include all citizens, because it will neither be useful nor possible and can lead to alienation.This is due to the large number of people that the process may attract, which will be constrained by space, time and money.Reliance has therefore been placed on community based organizations (CBOs), environmental groups and non-governmental organizations (NGOs) in modern democracies in expressing the views of citizens.Under this assumption, channels of communication are easily accessible to citizens.These groups may also be directly or indirectly affected by issues that are being discussed and may represent a wide range of interest that individuals may not have the capacity (Solitare, 2005).However, accountability of these groupings have become an issue in recent years, with others such as Naidoo (2003), Nelson and Wright (1995) arguing that they do not have the mandate of the people, since they do not represent any constituency but themselves.Based on this assertion, the DWA representative was asked whether they investigate these groupings about their objectives, funding as well as achievements in their own communities.The following quote captures the response of representatives from the DWA: "We don't investigate the organizational structure of NGOs and CBOs and their objectives…we don't investigate their number or years of existence, their success in the community but they introduce themselves at the forum as to who they are but we don't investigate them" The above statement indicates that these groupings are not investigated.This tends to create an illusion that they are interacting with the community or serving as intermediaries, but in reality the organizations may exist for themselves.Respondents from CBOs and NGOs were asked whether they interact with members of their community after meetings and the quotes below are the response obtained from respondents.
"After the meeting we share it (information) in our organization but not to the whole community but I often call meeting with members of my organization (eight members of that organization)" "After meeting (the CMF) I call a meeting with members of my organization to inform them what we discussed (at the CMF) but I have to give them transport which I don't have so it doesn't happen always but if I have the money I call them to tell them" "No I used to tell (what was discussed at the CMF) to members of my organization but not the whole community" "I am the secretary so I am the one who often attends the meeting (CMF) and when I come back (from the CMF) I call a meeting to tell members of my organization what was discussed…we are eight in the organization" These statements indicate that, NGOs and CBOs which are attending the CMF are not serving any purpose to the communities.This is because these organizations do not serve as intermediaries between their communities and the organizers of CMF, due to their lack of interaction with members of their communities.The lack of interaction between the CMF participants and the general community makes community organizations less favorable at the moment for the DWA to depend on as intermediaries between the community and the forum.There is therefore the need for investigation of the background of participants who represent organizations in order to know whether they have the mandate of their community.A self-regulatory method of accountability, which according to Naidoo (2003), is the development of code of conduct through a participatory process.This will help to determine the standards expected of NGOs and CBOs in terms of their performance in their communities should therefore be discussed with these groups by DWA.The self-regulatory mechanism will ensure that community organizations voluntarily give themselves the responsibility of reaching out to people in their locality.Other existing leadership structures in the community such as resident associations; ward councils and committees should also be engaged by the organizers of the CMF to ensure a broader participation of the public.Smit (2003) found councilors to function as a key communication channel between administrators and residents in catchment management forums.According to Smit (2003), councilors should be engaged by organizers of the participation process, such as the CMFs, since they can provide valuable information and contacts at the grassroots level about people who have interest in water resources management.People with interest in community welfare, such as the parish priest should also be contacted, since they are most often involved in resolving community issues and able to identify community members that have interest in water resource management.Feldman and Khademian (2007) have argued that an effective inclusive participation should be a sustainable deal that creates public value in three areas: substantively valuable; legitimately and politically sustainable; and operationally and administratively feasible.That is, an inclusive process must be of value to the public by political overseers and will be feasible, given organisational capacities and resources.As observed in this study, the lack of interaction between participants from the disadvantaged community and the general public in their community makes these participants less favourable as intermediaries between the community and the organizers of the CMF.To ensure an inclusive participation, it is vital for the organizers of the CMF to engage other existing leadership structures in the community to be fully engaged by the CMF organizers.

Understanding of information:
Critical to inclusiveness is access to relevant information and ability to comprehend the information.The language, style and format in which information is disseminated in a participation process can affect participants' comprehension of the information.It is essential to ensure that the majority of participants understand the language that is used in the participation process, through the avoidance or explanation of unfamiliar terms and jargon.Repackaging of the technical information so that participants understand and engage in deliberations is therefore vital in a participation process (EPA, 2001).
Participants were therefore asked if they understand the information presented at the CMF.Below are some of the responses obtained from respondents: "The information they present is always calculation which I don't understand" "Sometimes they talk about things you don't even understand" "They just give us statistics that two months ago the water was like this and this time the water is like this sometimes for the whole year.They say we tested this time and the water was so much dirty or clean but we are getting improved but I am not clear because we don't know how the technicians do (arrive at their answers)" The responses from these disadvantaged community participants could give an indication that information presented at the CMF is often technical.A DWA representative was asked to confirm the technicality of the information presented in the CMF.His response was: "The technical issues are the heart of the forum I guess in this particular instance (CMF) because the water quality is a huge issue.So the technical nature of issues and its language will be difficult for them (disadvantaged community stakeholders)" The lack of understanding of technical information in a participation process affects the meaningful participation of participants.When participants are unable to understand information presented in a participation process, they are unable to contribute to the process, thus making them virtual members of the processes.A follow-up question was therefore asked to find out from the DWA representatives and advantaged organization stakeholders, whether the stakeholders from the disadvantaged community group make contribution during the CMF.This question was prompted by complaints made by the disadvantaged community participants about the technical nature of information presented at the CMF.Some responses as observed by other participants were: "They (disadvantaged community representatives) don't talk and I don't know if they lack confidence or they are not sure what is being discussed or they might have something to say but they are intimidated because unfortunately the CMF is white attended" "I have noticed that most (disadvantaged community participants) don't communicate at all but the presentation is to educate the people" "They (disadvantaged community participants) actually do not speak so I think (DWA) will have to empower them to speak, you (DWA) have to make them to speak otherwise they will not say anything so you have to address questions to them otherwise on their own they will not speak even if given opportunity to them" "I think there are areas where communities come to the process and they (disadvantaged community participants) don't understand the terminologies and what the forum is responsible for and its duties …" In a participation process, individuals can only contribute effectively, when they have accurate and timely information.It is therefore vital to present information in a general and nontechnical manner.This will enhance ease of understanding.Generally, information that are too technical will usually, discourage public participation (Magnum & Henning, 1999).In the opinion of the Scottish Parliament Participation Handbook (2004), a participation process with technical information, whereby participants do not understand, amounts to tokenism of participation, since participants are unable to absorb the technical information and contribute (Arnstein, 1969).There is a need for the content of technical information to be presented in a plain language that will ensure that participants understand what is presented at the forum.The understanding of technical information by participants in a participation process has been found by Kilpio et al. (2005) and Lankford et al. (2004), to improve through a social learning process, irrespective of the level of knowledge.Lankford et al. (2004) used a simulated social learning model to explain the effects of upstream abstraction of a river on the downstream users.Such a process is normally seen as technical in terms of water allocation that would have required mathematical calculation that the local population would not have been able to understand.In the opinion of Kilpio et al. (2005), social learning simulations, if used for educational purpose in a participation process, will enable the distribution of knowledge among participants by making them active learners and not passive recipients of information by seeing the consequences of their actions.An effective participation process should have a two-way exchange of information between the agencies and the public.Because this information should normally be linked to goals and objectives, it is vital for such agencies to clarify to the public what to understand, information that is needed and how they can help influence decisions that concerns them (Geiring, 2011).
The manner in which information is presented in a participation process affects the information comprehension by participants.This is because individuals learn differently, which requires a variation in the manner in which information is presented to them.The presentation of information in a participation process should therefore be in a manner that will be relevant to everyone in a participation process.When respondents were asked how information is presented during meetings, the uniform response was that information is always presented through power point presentation.This was also confirmed by the DWA representative for CMF.The problem with power point presentation in a participation process is that it creates a distance between the speaker and the audience, with the audience becoming passive, which makes active participation after presentation a difficult task (Scottish Parliament Participation Handbook, 2004).Multiple methods of information presentation, such as site visits, which been found to be useful in a participation process by improving learning and interaction among participants should be explored (Canadian Association of Petroleum Producers-CAPP, 2003;Petts, 2001).According to CAPP (2003) and Petts (2001), the use of site visits, greatly improves the knowledge of participants since they get the opportunity to see the issues that are discussed, which may not be at their locality.Site visits also improve participants' interaction, due to their informal nature, therefore bringing participants closer in expressing their grievances to each other.

Medium and timing of notification:
A good public awareness creation provides opportunity for all participants that are interested in a participation process to be included in the processes (Anderson, 2005).The medium of notification is as important as awareness creation, due to its influence on participants in a participation process.A representative of DWA was asked about how they notify stakeholders.
"We try all avenues.Posting is the main one so we rely on the information they provide at the meetings but we found that sometimes being illiterate they just copy some ones box (postal) rather than their box (postal).We also rely on e mailing and in some instances we do fax but other forums we use to phone and in other instances we advertise the forum in the Newspaper (Natal witness) and the Echo" From the response of the DWA representative, some of the best available means of awareness creation, such as advertisement is used together with both electronic and postal mailing.However, the inability of some participants from the disadvantaged communities to properly put down their own postal box may be an indication that they are unable to even read the advertisement in the newspapers, even when they have access these newspapers.Roefs and Liebenberg (2005), in their research on how most citizens of South Africa obtain their information found the radio to be preferred by most South Africans, as a means of receiving their information.A broadcast-oriented channel of communication, such as the radio also requires little or low levels of literacy in understanding information.Radio may therefore be an effective tool in raising awareness and improving the medium of notification among the disadvantaged communities' participants, who may be illiterate in the CMF.
The timing of notification is also important if a participation process is to be meaningful.This helps in improving the relationship between participants and organizers of a participation process (EPA, 2001).When respondents were asked on how the medium and timing of notification affects their meaningful participation in the CMF, selected responses were as follows: "When we are at meetings they (DWA) give us the date for the next meeting.The notification is affecting those in the townships because if you don't come to meetings you will not know when the next meeting will come on because they (DWA) don't announce it on the radio and it doesn't come to the newspapers" "They (DWA) use to inform me through the phone.They (DWA) do tell us the objective of the meeting but the problem is the time because sometime the just phone you today (Monday) and the meeting is on Wednesday so there is no time to prepare" "Sometimes a week to the meeting and sometimes they (DWA) phone me maybe on Monday and say there is a meeting and I just go.Sometimes if I meet somebody I know the person will tell me there is a meeting they did not tell you and the person will say we must go" "They (DWA) write to me to attend meetings and also got a call from Cape Town that there will be a workshop so I must be there.They (DWA) sometimes give us agenda but sometimes they don't especially when they phone" "The agenda is sent (by DWA) to me through the post and I think it is about twice that I missed that meeting because it did not arrive on time because I don't have a box so somebody always brings it to so if I don't see that person I can't go there…..and I don't know whether they (DWA) will allow me to come with others because they invited me only but I need more support from other people so I don't think it's useful to call me only" These statements indicate that stakeholders from the disadvantaged community were not satisfied with the medium in which they are notified, since it indirectly affects their meaningful participation because it does not allow them to prepare their inputs.Information needs to be disseminated in good time for interested parties to prepare their inputs in a timely fashion, including consulting with constituencies if they are acting as representatives of their communities (CAPP, 2003).This is however, based on the assumption that participants understand the information given to them and will help participants to offer better suggestions if they have time to think about the issues, consider implication and formulate their views to contribute meaningfully.

Conclusion
The importance of a public participation has been established in literature and legislation, but attention should be shifted to how best to make it more meaningful to the public.The CMF in South Africa occupy a unique position to shape and enhance its procedures and mechanisms for the public participation process.The CMF organizers should therefore not see the physical presence of disadvantaged community stakeholders as a sign of meaningful public participation.There is also a need to place emphasis on the development of skills and capacity of participants to understand and make meaningful contributions, especially participants from the disadvantaged communities.The skill and capacity of the organizers of CMF also needs to be developed in order to enhance their relation to participants in order to know their level of satisfaction in the participation processes.
Further research is however needed to determine the type of capacity building that will be needed to improve the skills and knowledge of disadvantaged community participants in CFM.This will help to ensure they are integral part of the water resource management process.