Cape Town and the water crisis : a knock-on effect of the appartheid system ?

 Since 2015, a persistent drought has affected the West of Cap Province in South Africa. On February 1st, 2018, the city is in a state of natural disaster, reaches a level of water restriction of level 6B (for example,over 200 water collection points will be set up in the municipality in preparation for the taps being shut off. Residents will have to queue up to receive an allocation of 25 litres of water per person, per day..(1)). A consumption of 50 liters per day per minute then becomes the norm necessary to avoid the arrival of the "zero day", where the water would no longer flow to the taps.The region, the metropolis Cape-town and its people are affected by a severe water scarcity (3,8 million of inhabitants are concerned in 2018 (2)). In this article we will take a look at this major crisis, this state of natural disaster mirroring the succession and the failure of political reforms that have succeeded in recent decades. Water management is intimately dependent on government and regional policies. More than just an issue, it's a challenge for people in Cape Town.The"Blue Gold" reflects the profound socio-economic disparities that affect Cape Town. What are the political means put in place by local and governmental political actors to mitigate this disaster? How is the resilience policy expressed in the city?

Sub-Tropicale climate

    Cape Town has a warm Mediterranean climate. The water is abundant, because of the montains that make up the landscape, which allowed the first Dutch settlers to settle without difficulty and to work the land there and then sell the crops. The region offers a climate, landscapes and especially resources, mining as agricultural, that the rest of South Africa envy it without question.
At the boundary between the tropical zone and the temperate zone, in the subtropical latitudes extend so-called Mediterranean climates. These climates are characterized by two distincts seasons: a cool rainy season centered on winter (May to August), and a hot warm rainless season centered on summer (November to April).
The city and its water needs are mostly covered by rainwater. During the wet season the water is stored in dams upstream. There are five dams on the top of Table Mountain overlooking the Cap region. The Berg River that flowed off the mountain is the principle stream and source of water. With the increased demand of water, government and engineers built tunnels and pipe tracks. Woodhead Reservoir is the first dam of Table Mountain built in 1897 by the Britain's. All of these dams reflected cases of emergency, where the city's demands easily outstripped the supply.



Map of the major dams in the Cape Town water system, 25 January 2018. Cape_Water_map_dams.png

The Day Zero threat

For several years now, the Western Cape region in South Africa has been suffering from severe droughts and severe climate disruption, particularly over the past three years. 2015/2016 were the years of two consecutives dry winter and the water levels City dams decline dramatically as we can see on the board below. Over the past 30 years the average annual temperature in South Africa has increased.

With measures dam levels of the water available (04/10/2019), Cape Town's Inhabitants could check how much water is available for the region and whether water restrictions.This document is provided by the City of Cape Town and the National Department of Water and Sanitation. 

http://www.capetown.gov.za/Family%20and%20home/residential-utility-services/residential-water-and-sanitation-services/this-weeks-dam-levels

  

Climate Change in South Africa, Berkeley Earth, 2015.  http://berkeleyearth.lbl.gov/regions/south-africa

   

       The water level decreases drastically until the fateful day, the " Day Zero". On Day Zero the majority of the water distribution system for the City would be shut down. Water would be limited to residents to 25 litres per person per Day according to the World Health Organisation (WHO) minimum short term emergency survival recommendations. The reservoir levels supplying Cape Town would fall below 13,5% (3).  In June 2018, consumption savings and good rains allowed the reservoirs to increase their levels by at least 43% and the city announced that a repeat of "zero day" was unlikely for 2019.

Political Backgrounds

they never freed us, the only took the chain from around our neck and put it on our ankles

  Rassol Snyman, a social activist, abstrait from The stock doctrine, Naomi Klein, chapter 10.

    Today, the main issue is that with the increase of the population, the demand clearly exceeds the supply. Since the end of the nineteenth century, the rate of population growth in South Africa has increased as food supplies is becoming more abundant and reliable. Water and urban technical services such as electricity are held within the municipal and institutional apparatus. Geographers have called attention to the importance of residential segregation in shaping inequities in access to services.
Indeed the flow of in-migrants to African townships began in the mid 1980s with people from the former homelands fleeing rural poverty in search of employ- ment opportunities in Cape Town, one of the strongest urban economies in South Africa.

    In 1994, the legal and political end of apartheid has revealed an increasingly stark socio-economic difference, aggravated by the effects of population growth.
Since 1995, a municipal and national economy of scale has been put in place to improve the socio-spatial conditions of large cities. Water is part of this sectoral policy framework, an eminently important factor in improving the living conditions of the inhabitants. The integrate development of Townships areas became part of a political renewal. Before the Apartheid, The “Black Local Authorities” set up to govern townships areas generally confronted with corruption, overcrowded neighborhood and mismanagement. An administrative re-division is then put in place to get out of the institutional inheritance left by the Apartheid. Square the growing economy (a world class city) and the equality (a city that works for all), two cashwords in the heart of official lines. The promotion of water justice for all is the goal for metropolisation.

Aerial photo showing the gap between poor and rich areas in the Southern Cape Peninsula, about 20km from Cape Town’s city center, by the photographer Johnny Miller. https://unequalscenes.com/masiphumelele-lake-michelle

     The end of apartheid has deeply disrupted South African society. Local authorities have had great difficulty pursuing a development policy in view of the many inequities. The reduction of inter-governmental subsidies to municipal budgets. Local policies have had to move towards other service policies to meet the needs of all citizens.
In 1996, the adoption of a new macroeconomic approach, known as Growth, Employment and Redistribution (GEAR), definitely put policies on water and other basic needs in a rigorously new.
Following the recommendations of the World Bank, the International Monetary Fund and various Western governments (as well as the intensive lobbying of multinational water companies like Suez and Biwater), the government sharply reduced allocations and subsidies to municipalities, local governments, and encouraged the development of financial instruments to privatize the water service.
Many local governments privatized water services, or transformed them into businesses like any other, through service and management "partnerships" with multinational water companies.
But can the company produce distributive equity in a place with historically high levels of inequality?
   An interruption is thus prononce in 1994 with the election of the ANC party. Nelson Mandela is at the head of the ANC party, wanting the nationalisazion of the key sectors from the South-African economy, just as the Freedom Charter. The government was focus on two Parallels track, politics and economy. On 24 April 1994, a summit Took place between Mandela and Frederik de Klerk (member of the National Party). The National Party wanted the Independence of the Central Bank the contrarie of what the ANC claimed. This political tendency draws from the Washington Consensus which supports one way to run economy with neo-liberal economic policy prescriptions promoted for crisis-wrackeddeveloping countries. It puts forward internationals trade agreement and structural adjustements to hand control to : IMF, World bank, GATT. In the Shock Doctrine the journlastist Naomi Klein talks about the " Balkanization" of the South-African economy, a term that is normally used to refer to geographic region fragmentation. She notices that if the central bank was run separately from the rest of government it could restrict the ANC ability to keep the promises in the Freedom charter (mainly based on access to water services). The ANC showed itself in the impossibility of applying its policy. Unable to move freely, the economic budget is being eaten up servicing the massive debt. Economy controle firmly in the hand of a white ownership against nationalization, so the leadership of ANC had been outmaneuvered in the economic negotiations
The world bank made private sector partnerships the service norm. The privatization of water services increased. The ANC saw itself in the impossibility of applying its policy by the economic victory of the partisans of the National Party. This political episode will bring about the many repercussions that South Africa knows today. Even if apartheid has been abolished many advocates and defends allege the idea that the major water crisis has been revealing glaring inequalities for access to vital needs. With privatization, service prices increased. The neo-liberal cost recovery policy is to charge people for infrastructure costs. This inflation of water prices will particularly affect the poorest populations.
Many times municipalities have to resort to closing water taps because they couldn't pay the bills worsening social conditions and revolts in Townships.

the very mobility of capital and the globalization of the capital and other markets, make it impossible for countries, for instance, to decide national economic policy without regard to the likely response of these market, Nelson Mandela.

Rework the political cognition

   Governance needs to account for development of water sources. By narrowly escaping Day Zero, the city and its inhabitants have had to prove resilience. The effort must be on several scales. But today, policymakers cope with resources, power struggles, pressure from diverse stakeholders and political instability. The government needs to integrate the entire population of the city of South Africa. From a local point of view, the shock of Day Zero has deeply marked the conscience of the inhabitants. The inhabitants are more vigilant about their ways of consuming. Fines are imposed on households exceeding the limit of 105 liters per person (4). This corresponds to a level 3 restriction, according to the official authorities of the city of Cape Town. But is this water crisis with disastrous consequences now a thing of the past ?
However, in addition to official rhetoric, natural water resources can no longer be used as reliable sources of supply. Informal neighborhoods or Townships are growing in a province where paradoxically the HDI (Human Development Index) is the highest in South Africa.
The government needs to rethink how it sees resources. Water must be seen as an important factor of social and economic renewal for the city. A holistic assesment of its water management would cope with seasonal fluctuations and the effects of climate change. We have seen the water crisis on a social level but we must also remember the many effects of this crisis on agriculture, tourism and ecosystems that have been severely affected. In addition, water policy must not be negligent to avoid increased post-Apartheid tensions between communities.

1.  De Lille, P. (15 November 2017). Statement by the City's Executive Mayor. Day Zero: when is it, what is it, and how can we avoid it? http://www.capetown.gov.za/Media-and-news/Day%20Zero%20when%20is%20it,%20what%20is%20it,%20and%20how%20can%20we%20avoid%20it?
2. World Population Review, Cape Town population 2018. http://worldpopulationreview.com/world-cities/cape-town-population/
3. Parks, R. and al. (February 2019). Experiences and lessons in managing water from Cape Town, Imperial College London. https://www.imperial.ac.uk/media/imperial-college/grantham-institute/public/publications/briefing-papers/Experiences-and-lessons-in-managing-water.pdf
4. Western Cap Government (2019), https://www.westerncape.gov.za/general-publication/simple-ways-save-water-your-home?toc_page=1

• Klein, N. (2007). The Shock Doctrine.
• Pape, J and Mcdonal, D. (2003). Cost recovery and the crisis of service delivery in South Africa. https://kissly.net/book/6F24127084AEAFA7FA94?utm_source=ps6&utm_medium=ciupatgeti.cf&utm_campaign=fnom&x=506284
• Wilkinson, P. (2000). City profile: Cape Town. Cities, 17, 195–205.https://doi.org/10.1016/S0264-2751(99)00059-1
• Ziervogel, G. (2019b). Unpacking the Cape Town drought: Lessons learned. Cape Town, South Africa: Cities Support Programme and National Treasury of South Africa. https://www.africancentreforcities.net/wp-content/uploads/2019/02/Ziervogel-2019-Lessons-from-Cape-Town-Drought_A.pdf