Water has been intensely racialised and today is fast becoming politicised. The fact of the matter is that it should be solely ‘humanised’ – de-racialised and de-politicised.
Section 27(b) of the Constitution says that “every person has the right to access sufficient food and water”.
Water has been intensely racialised and today is fast becoming politicised. The fact of the matter is that it should be solely ‘humanised’ – de-racialised and de-politicised.
Section 27(b) of the Constitution says that “every person has the right to access sufficient food and water”.
So by law we should be receiving clean and sufficient amounts of water – what is happening now is simply illegal. Sitting through the forum on Monday was immensely frustrating.
I expected more substantial answers to emerge from the panel of experts but they all seemed to disagree. As a layman I had no idea firstly, what they were saying, the terms weren’t exactly user-friendly and secondly, I had no idea who to believe, as so many different viewpoints were being expressed.
On the one hand we had Martin Davies, of the Department of Ichthyology and Fishery Science, saying that after three years of research there is definitely a problem, on the other we have the technical and infrastrutural services director Dabula Njilo saying our tap water is safe to drink.
But at a council meeting the next day it was proclaimed that the water is safe to drink but we need to boil it first or or put bleach in it.
Seriously? I agree with Garth Cambray that the entire council should be forced to drink two litres of Grahamstown water right in front of us.
Another ridiculous aspect was how racialised it all was – all solutions were ‘middle-class’ based. Solutions such as creating a website for citizens to keep track of the situation and for all of us to buy water tanks is just not an option.
Firstly, a representative from the Unemployed Peoples’ Movement said many people in the township didn’t even know there was a water issue, and secondly, how can they be expected to check the internet let alone buy a water tank for the same price as their annual salary?
Politics also seem to be getting in the way.World-renowned specialists offered the municipality free assistance but, for political reasons, they were declined.
Now it is expected of us as a community – a not very wealthy one at that – to raise the money needed to hire these specialists and buy the necessary water sanitation equipment. Why we should now rectify this politically-motivated bad move is beyond me.
For such a basic human right there seems too much unnecessary contention and blame shift. It is our legal right to have sufficient, clean, water and, since we’re not getting this something needs to be done soon and fast, before we all forget what we’re even fighting for.
