Cape Town's water inequality - 20th April 2022

Four years ago, this area in South Africa looked like a desert and the water supply to Cape Town was on the verge of running dry. Today, the city water stocks are close to maximum capacity and swimming pools in private homes are full to overflowing.

But in the city's biggest and poorest township, Khayelitsha, water is still a scarce commodity.

Shadrack Mogress lives in the township. He believes the problem is worse than during the drought.

Shadrack Mogress: But it is actually worse than that. Because we do have water and we know that. We do have water. But it happens worst that it happened when there was a drought.”

The only water points in settlements like Khayelitsha are the ones attached to toilets built by the city. This means families have to collect water for their needs everyday. Sandile Zatu is also a resident.

Sandile Zatu: “We have no choice but to wake up in the morning and try to fill your bucket as much as you can.”

South Africa is the most unequal country in the world, with race playing a determining factor, according to a report by the World Bank.

The Cape Town authorities provided water to the townships during the pandemic to ensure greater hand washing, but this has now stopped.

Zahid Badroodien, representing the city authorities, says this is because of the increase in the number of illegal settlements.

Zahid Badroodien: “During the period of Covid 19, at least 17 new illegal informal settlements have been erected across our city, in the space of a few months, seventeen new illegal informal settlements. And the city then, is expected to provide basic services to those settlements, which is difficult to do.”

But the influx of people to the townships is nothing new and with further droughts inevitable, the calls for improved infrastructure go unheeded. Jo Barnes is a community health agent at Stellenbosch University.

Jo Barnes: “Part of that is outside the control of the city but this has been going on for the last 30 years and I’ve actually seen very little forward planning to cope with these people. It seems to me, and I hope I’m not attributing something to them, but it seems to me as if they thought if they just leave it alone and let them settle where they were, and it is unpleasant, that they will go back."