Deputy President Cyril Ramaphosa has sprung into action to help Cape Town come to terms with the water crisis.
“I am going back home and I’m going to corral as many people as possible to put our heads together and see exactly what we should be doing, not only in the immediate term but also in the long-term. But in the immediate term, we’ve got to make sure that we bring water to the people of Cape Town without fail,” Ramaphosa said at the World Economic Forum meeting in Davos, Switzerland.
On Monday, Democratic Alliance leader Mmusi Maimane wrote an open letter to Ramaphosain in his capacity as Leader of Government Business, requesting an urgent meeting to discuss the best way forward. Maimane is expected to brief the media later on Tuesday about the latest dam levels and the progress of the city’s water augmentation plans.
The City of Cape Town announced on Sunday that it has opened its Disaster Operations Centre that will carry out its Water Disaster Plan as Day Zero approaches. According to the latest data on dam levels released on Monday, dam levels for Cape Town are at 26.3% as at January 29, 2018.
The possibility of Day Zero has already had a bleak impact on the City’s economy. Credit rating agency Moody’s said that the water crisis is credit negative and has placed the City on review for a rating downgrade. The credit rating agency also said that two of the City’s two main industries, tourism and agriculture, is likely to decline.
Picture: Desalination site in Monwabisi, CoCT