Cape Town – Humanitarian organisation Gift of the Givers dispatched a truck to Beaufort West to deliver water after receiving a request from the municipality.
“A Gift of the Givers truck is on its way to Beaufort West Tuesday with water sponsored by Spur. The Laingsburg community has also requested water through the local church. This will be delivered on Thursday,” said the organisation.
In a letter to the organisation, the municipality’s communication officer, Marlene Hendricks, said: “The Beaufort West Municipality will be running out of emergency bottled water within the next day.
"This is a direct result of the low reservoir levels in town over the past months that caused the municipality to distribute the emergency water that was donated by Gift of the Givers for Day Zero and emergency cases.
“The municipality now has 700 × 2 litres of water left in the Essop emergency storage room. The storage room at the Karoo Recreational Hall is empty after a peak festive season.”
According to the letter, the town had 40 boreholes and is now operating on 27. It is 16% dependent on the reclamation plant.
“In the absence of rain, the town engineering department predicts it will lose more boreholes. The demand of water in terms of usage is high.
“We appeal to Gift of the Givers to assist the municipality with emergency bottled water for the storerooms. This will enable the town to respond to emergency cases like low reservoir levels and during the time that the reclamation plant is being serviced.
“We would really appreciate your help and support,” read the letter.
Local Government, Environmental Affairs and Development Planning MEC Anton Bredell’s spokesperson, James-Brent Styan, said the department was not aware of a pressing water emergency requiring immediate bottled water in Beaufort West and Laingsburg.
“Information from our specialists on the ground is that the towns have a sufficient supply of piped water.
“The reclamation plant is working in Beaufort West and there is water in the reservoirs in both towns. Accordingly, there is no emergency at present as far as we are concerned,” he said.
Styan said the drought remained ongoing and long-term by nature and required an ongoing effort by all stakeholders to ensure communities did not run out of drinking water.
“This remains the worst drought in recent memory, an unprecedented event. The department has several ongoing interventions in place across the entire region, including several experts on the ground monitoring the situation continuously.
“The department will also be sending another delegation to the towns of Beaufort West and Oudtshoorn this week to further determine the needs on the ground,” Styan said.