Cape Town – For some residents of drought-stricken Cape Town, the prospect of the taps running dry is almost too much to bear.

For others, the thought of queueing under the scorching summer sun for a meagre daily water ration will be a necessary evil to keep their businesses solvent.

But the day, currently forecast for April 12, has been creeping closer – brought forward by the city’s excessive consumption despite repeated public warnings from increasingly panicked officials.

On Day Zero, the ordinary water supply will be shut down and taps will run dry.

READ: Capetonians might have to do ‘royal flush’ soon

Residents of the city of four million will then be forced to collect a daily water ration of just 25l from 200 water collection points – not even enough for a two-minute shower in normal times.

With about 5000 families for each water collection point, the police and army are ready to be deployed to prevent unrest in the lines.

Farrel Cohen, manager of the Metropolitan Golf Club in Mouille Point close to the city’s World Cup stadium, said he was “too afraid to even think about” what “Day Zero” would mean for Cape Town.

“Nobody knows what to expect – people are running to supermarkets to buy water,” he said.

The central business district will likely be spared a total shut-off to protect the economy.

READ: Water for all or the city must fall – Cape Town protesters

But the full impact of a major global city losing its piped potable water supply is unknown.

Reservoirs around Cape Town, in the grip of its worst drought for a century, have gone largely unreplenished for more than three years in the absence of significant rainfall and are about to run dry.

Residents are now ordered to use just 87l daily – falling to 50l on February 1 – to conserve supply.

A typical shower uses 15l per minute while a standard toilet consumes up to 15l per flush, according to WaterWise, a South African water usage awareness campaign.

‘Cancelled trips’

Cohen, whose fairways have suffered from the water restrictions, said that the realities of life after “Day Zero” were hard to understand.

“We haven’t been notified, it’s a bit of an unknown,” he said.

Businesses are feeling the pinch too. As well as having to contend with costly limits on their water use, tourists from home and abroad have been deterred from visiting South Africa’s “Mother City”.

“I know many overseas visitors who cancelled their trips because of the conditions,” said Cohen.

The city has nearly halved its consumption from an estimated 1.1 billion litres a day in 2016 to 586 million litres daily now.

But every day that Capetonians use more than 500 million litres brings “Day Zero” forward.

And the fall in consumption is hurting the city in other ways with lost revenues from water bills putting pressure on Cape Town’s coffers.

Nikita Elliott, the manager of the “Cape to Cuba” waterfront restaurant in Kalk Bay – a tourist hotspot outside the city centre – is plotting how to keep the business going using only water from standpipes.

“It will be a major extra task and I also think it will be very costly – but business is business, we’ll have to do what we can to stay afloat,” she said.

‘Arrogant and shortsighted’

The restaurant has stopped serving tap water and instead offers bottled water from Durban on the opposite coast.

It has also erected signs encouraging guests to only flush solids, installed a blockage alarm to prevent burst pipes and now washes dishes by hand rather than machine.

“We’ve gone all the way,” said Elliott.

“A lot of business owners and regular citizens have taken this into their own hands and are doing what they can.”

READ: So madam minister, where is the water? – asks Cape Town deputy mayor

Marna Esterhuizen, 40, says she wants the current daily individual limit slashed in half immediately to avoid the standpipe scenario.

“I also think the name-and-shame option isn’t a bad idea. The water map shows what is happening in some of the wealthier neighbourhoods and that disappoints me – it is arrogant and shortsighted,” she said referring to a council-published list of the thirstiest users.

“I miss a nice long shower in the morning, but now I have a timer in the shower to ensure it is only two minutes long.”

But less than half of Capetonians are adhering to the current daily water usage limit.

“It is quite unbelievable that a majority of people do not seem to care and are sending all of us headlong towards ‘Day Zero’,” mayor Patricia de Lille said last week.

She slammed transgressors for “callous” behaviour and said “Day Zero” appeared “very likely”.

JOHANNESBURG – Hugh Masekela’s sister, Barbara, says the jazz icon fought his illness bravely.

The 78-year-old world renowned artist passed away on Tuesday after a battle with cancer.

Barbara thanked the doctors who took care of her brother.

Sunday’s memorial at the University of Johannesburg’s Soweto Campus was the final public event for the jazz icon.

Masekela’s close friend, Gabby Magomola, said his life was built around loving and caring for others. 

Arts and Culture Minister Nathi Mthethwa says Masekela’s death is not just a loss for the country, but for the world.

Composer Caiphus Semenya says Masekela would have wanted to be bid farewell through song.

Semenya and other artists, including musicians and poets, paid tribute at Sunday’s event.

eNCA

Johannesburg – President Jacob Zuma is expected to host a dinner on Saturday to commemorate the centenary celebrations of the late president Nelson Mandela, the Presidency said.

The dinner will be hosted on the side-lines of the 30th ordinary session of the assembly of heads of State and government of the African Union (AU).  The summit is scheduled to take place from Sunday until Monday.

“During the 2018 January Statement of the African National Congress, the AU Summit was identified as a critical platform to launch the Celebrations,” the presidency said in a statement.

The dinner is expected to be attended by heads of state and government.

“The Year 2018 marks the Centenary of former President of the ANC, first President of the Democratic South Africa, Nelson Mandela.

“This year South Africa and the entire globe is organising a range of activities to celebrate and honour the former Statesman.”

Mandela died on December 5, 2013. He would have turned 100 years in July. 

VREDE, Free State – About half of the intended beneficiaries identified to benefit from the Gupta-linked Estina Dairy Project in Vrede in the Free State in 2013 have given their statements to the Hawks.
This comes after the crime fighting body raided the Free State Premier and Agriculture Department’s offices on Friday.

The Hawks spent much of Saturday interviewing people who were earmarked to benefit from the multi-million empowerment project that never materialised.

READ: Hawks promise Vrede farm announcement that will ‘shake’ SA

It was a slow start to a much-anticipated day.

About 80 people went to make their voices heard – the Hawks only get through about half of them.

Cambridge Sebiloane, one of the intended beneficiaries, said: “As beneficiaries, none of us have been employed at the dairy farm and none of us have gotten anything from there. So that is the concern we have raised with the Hawks, on the statements that they took from us.”

The Hawks’ raid on those believed to be implicated in the Estina Dairy Project has bolstered its tarnished image.

A former local councillor, who objected to the project from the very beginning, now wants to see follow-through.

WATCH: Those who defended the Vrede dairy farm

Former DA Phumelela Municipality councillor Doctor Radebe said: “The Hawks mustn’t just go to the crime scene, they must arrest people. There are so many people who wrongfully benefited from this project and if the Hawks can come down to the people on the ground, people will show them who are the ones who benefitted from that dairy [farm].”

The Hawks will continue taking statements on Sunday, until all beneficiaries have been interviewed.

The intended beneficiaries will be meeting on 4 February to map a way forward.

The Hawks on Friday promised an announcement on the matter that will “shake” the country.

eNCA

2018-01-26 14:46

Mmusi Maimane

Day Zero has moved from a possibility to a probability. But it is not yet inevitable.

The Cape drought crisis has triggered heated emotions and a lot of disagreement about who is to blame. But one thing we can agree on: we have to avoid Day Zero. And another thing we must accept: the only way to defeat Day Zero is to use less water.

When descending too rapidly with a faulty parachute, the sense of looming disaster is not pleasant, but it is nothing when compared to the actual experience of hitting the ground. The inconvenience of getting by on 50 litres a day is nothing compared to a water system switched off altogether.

So everyone affected has to make the changes necessary to get down to 50 litres per day. If we achieve 50 litres per day from 1 February (but don’t wait, start now) then we can push out Day Zero far enough that our water augmentation projects (which should start supplying 120 million litres additional water by May 2018) and (hopefully) some winter rainfall will offer some relief. If we cannot achieve this, then the taps will be turned off on Day Zero, currently calculated to be 12 April – just 76 days from now.

We can still avoid this massive systemic disruption to our lives, but it means each one of us accepting that there is no way around this tough but doable water restriction. We can choose to be defeated, or we can choose to show the world that we are up to the challenge.

Living on 50 litres per person per day isn’t ideal but it is entirely doable. I know because I’m doing it myself right now and there has been no significant impact on my personal wellbeing. In fact, my family has now set our own target of 40 litres per person per day – I’ll keep you posted!

The fact is, the difference to our lives between 50 versus 25 litres per day will still be much less than the difference between 25 litres out of our home taps versus 25 litres that we must queue for and collect from a designated point.

Water restrictions aren’t a failure to plan. They are part of a plan. Every City faces highs and lows in water supply, and every City lays out water restrictions to ease temporary lows in supply. In our case, the water restrictions are extremely severe, because this drought is extremely severe. This is an unprecedented situation. It demands an unprecedented response.

What is being done to “help” people achieve this target? The City is reducing water pressure and at times, switching water off altogether to some parts of the city, for up to 12 hours at a time. A Water Inspectorate team is tasked with responding to water restriction contraventions.

Each week, the City is installing 2000-2500 water demand devices in the worst offending households. And there will be steep penalties for over-use, which is mainly a problem in formal housing areas. (Informal settlements constitute one third of Cape Town’s population and use only 4% of Cape Town’s water allocation.)

But please don’t let this stop you from policing people in your neighbourhood. Peer pressure is powerful. And thank you to everyone who has risen to the challenge of defeating Day Zero.

Although no additional water will be produced this summer to help us avoid Day Zero, much has been and is being done to boost supply. Seven projects are expected to produce an additional 120 million litres per day from May 2018. These include groundwater extraction from Atlantis, Cape Flats and Table Mountain Group aquifers, three small-scale desalination at Strandfontein, Monwabisi and the Waterfront and waste water treatment at Zandvliet. I’ll give more detail about our medium and long term plans for boosting supply in next week’s newsletter.

If we don’t rise to the challenge of defeating Day Zero, then I want to reassure you that a massive amount of preparation is going into ensuring that residents will have safe access to 25 litres per person per day once the water supply system is shut down. The city and province are working on a plan to make distribution as safe and convenient as possible, details of which will be communicated well in advance. Informal settlements, hospitals, essential services, CBD areas and schools will continue to be supplied with water as far as possible.

But no matter how good our Day Zero plan is, our Defeat Day Zero plan involves a whole lot less effort and inconvenience for everyone concerned. So become a Day Zero Hero today – all you need is determination and buckets.

– Maimane is leader of the DA.

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