THE Water Services Industry Act 2006 (WSIA) was more bark than bite for 18 long years.
Water thieves and river polluters weren't too bothered with the slap on-the-wrist penalties of the WSIA, which a fine up to RM100,000 and an imprisonment of up to one year are.
Little wonder, water theft and water disruption due to river pollution have become too frequent.
Just as the amended WSIA with a 10-fold increase in bite was making its way through the Dewan Rakyat, a construction company in Gombak was caught illegally piping water for 538 days in a joint raid by the National Water Services Commission (SPAN) and Air Selangor.
The Selangor water operator estimated its loss to be nearly RM500,000. To such water thieves, the fine of RM100,000 is just piddling. We welcome the revamped WSIA.
But as always, the problem is not the lack of laws in Malaysia, but absence of robust enforcement.
Even with the old WSIA, how often have we read about shareholders or directors of companies found guilty of water theft spending time in prison?
As rare as hen's teeth. The toothy WSIA must not be wasted; prosecutors must push the court to impose the maximum of fines and imprisonment.
Here is why. Water companies are bleeding money due to water theft. According to the Malaysian Water Association, water theft cases almost doubled to 229, with water operators losing close to RM6 million last year.
Based on SPAN's raids, the usual suspects are con struction companies, industrial plants, cement companies, poultry and vegetable farms.
But water theft is only one of the several non-revenue water (NRW), what the water service operators call water that is treated and pumped but not paid for.
The others being water supply disruptions due to river pollution, pipe leaks, loss during maintenance and inaccurate meter readings.
River pollution deserves a special mention. This is a frequent headache for water service operators and a heartache for the people and businesses.
According to an analysis done on 1,353 river stations by Pemandu Associates, a local consultancy, 99 were flagged as "polluted" and 318 as "slightly polluted".
With about 80 per cent of our water coming from rivers, this is a cause for great concern.
SPAN agrees that much of the water supply disruptions are caused by river pollution, mainly by industrial discharges, illegal dumping and agriculture runoffs.
These usual suspects must be kept in constant view now that the amended WSIA allows the courts to order those responsible for pollution to cover the cost of restoring water supply.
The consultancy 's analysis shows that the country lost 5,524 million litres per day (MLD) to NRW this year, amounting to 34.6 per cent.
In its estimate, Malaysia's water service operators are projected to lose about RM2 billion this year, slightly lower than RM2.3 billion last year.
This can only go up with SPAN projecting national water loss to reach 9,037 MLD of NRW by 2030 if nothing is done.
Build back better is our advice. Malaysia, which is keeping its eyes on becoming a high-income country by 2027, can't afford to lose this much water.