Imtiaz Sooliman – Gift of the Givers speaks about the KZN flood relief efforts
AI: Summary ©
The devastating impact of floods on people and their homes, including lost possessions and damaged water systems, has caused devastation. The number of informal settlements and the devastation caused by the flood are noted. The speakers express sympathy and offer condolences to the city and its people. The lack of housing repairs and funding for rebuilds are also addressed, with concerns raised about the potential for thousands of people to remain in a community hall due to the flood. The speakers emphasize the importance of national disaster recovery and finding new homes for those lost.
AI: Summary ©
Alright, let's shift our focus now to KwaZulu Natal. It's over a
month since those devastating floods, and for many people, life
is nowhere near back to normal. Ngo, gift of the givers we know,
has been working very closely with government and other organizations
trying to help people who've lost their homes, who've lost
everything. In fact, let's speak now to the Foundation's director,
Dr intiaz Suleiman, Dr Suleiman, thank you so much for your time
this evening. So we know that people have lost their homes,
they've lost their possessions. We know that water has been out of
commission because of the pipes that were broken and sort of
drifted away. Which of the areas that you're most concerned about
over one month on since the floods,
two main areas. Good evening Sally and condolences to the ANC and to
the ex the mayor and his family. You know it's a great loss to the
city and to the country and to his family. You know, our deepest
condolences to the family, to really Travis news to hear that
right now
that the areas that we seriously consider about is the fact that
houses haven't started here, you know, Aussie hasn't commenced in
the huge volumes of homes that have been lost. People are still
staying with neighbors, but family with friends still staying in
halls and community centers. That's not going to be last for
long. People may then be forced to go back and burn on the flood
plains where we don't want them to go, and where the problem started
in the first place. That's a major challenge. The second challenge
is, which is a huge challenge, is the water system that has broken
down in Tonga, and they were looking at eight to 10 months to
repair, and that process hasn't commenced yet. That's a major,
major challenge. And right now, so different mechanisms of supporting
water inside Tonga. When I say Tonga, I mean the communities, the
informal settlements, areas around Tonga. On the outside, all those
areas, there's bottled water, there's tankers, and we busy. We
build, we visit. Our 10th ball, already, many more to be drilled
in area. The third area that needs a strength in is the schools. A
lot of schools need to be repaired, and we already started
starting repair of those schools. We've commissioned project
managers, engineers, they've been on site. The plans have been drawn
up in terms of what has to be repaired, the costing, and we've
already given the contract for the first nine schools to be repaired.
And the last one, which also very worrying, are the clinics and the
hospitals that require
repair, because in the one of the things that has happened in the
floods in Eastern Cape last year, there's 49 health facilities which
haven't really paid up to Lao falling the flood damage last
year. And all those facilities, you know, it's a huge loss to the
patients who come to it. We don't want a similar situation.
Insights, in case they didn't, where many people cannot attend
health facilities because of infrastructure problems. So those
are the main areas. By five large requirement for food, and food has
decreased substantially for hygiene packs. You know, bottled
water is still required because water comes and goes. But the
other areas that I mentioned are the critical areas. So I want to
try and get an idea of the numbers. You say that houses have
not started yet. So the building of houses for people who lost
their homes, the allocation of areas where they can build safely.
Do you have a number of how many people are in this situation? You
talk about more than 40 or 50,000 people. You know you're talking
about the number of houses informal settlements, more than
4000 homes in in that category. And besides that, so many homes
have been destroyed. We only saw the real effect of this flood,
like three weeks afterwards, not not during the flood itself, and
not in the first few days. I mean, I'm driving the roads right now,
and you know, because the sinkhole is on the entry, which has finally
been repaired yesterday, you have to use side roads. And when you
take the side roads off the highway, you realize how extensive
the storm actually was, how far down the how? How far down case it
then it came towards marysburg. Yes, there was some damage in
marysburg, in Finlay, in amsterdale Ridge, you know, in
Phillips day. But you actually see the houses, the land, the
topography, the roads, how they've been cut. It's huge. And when
you're driving to other areas, when you're going on site visits,
you're seeing a lot of things which everybody didn't capture,
because it's just so much. There's so much. So the destruction is
far, far, far more than what we know. That's astonishing. I mean,
when you said 40 to 50,000 people who are still waiting for some
form of shelter beyond where they're staying currently in a
community hall. Do you have a figure on how many people are
being affected by this tongot water supply situation, which
you're saying is going to take months to fix?
Will you entire town? You
know, it's just 1000s of people. I don't know the exact figures, but
there's 1000s of people, because if you ask them, they said they
never knew so many people to stay in the town only when they saw the
flood damage and they saw the houses getting washed away. It's
only then that the people who live in the town for years suddenly
realized there's so many people in the town, and there's 1000s of
houses, you know, along the flood plains, you know, in one area,
along 2000 the other one, 1000 The other area, 500 and then the
community is going further out. You multiplied it by five or six
feet, Charles, it's.
Going to run it 10s of 1000s of people. Wow. I want to ask
remember when they're going to divert they're going to dive from
pipelines, from water from other areas? You know, they look at
contingency plans. But when that happens, the areas where the water
is coming from, they going to have a dip in their water supply. So
when you going to try to solve a problem in one side, you're going
to have water rationing in other areas. And besides Tonga, you
know, we're still getting feedback from other areas saying they have
no water, not only because of the floods, some people haven't had
water since 2002
so there's other areas we have to look at that require water,
besides the plant damaged areas, I want to get a sense from you.
You're saying that these houses that they haven't started
rebuilding. Do you have a sense why? And the reason I'm asking
that because I want to know if you believe that funding is the
problem. My understanding of how the funding for these rebuilds
will happen is that the provincial government and the city will take
its funds available so that it's released easier, so the rebuild
can start, and at that point, they can then apply to be reimbursed
from Treasury. Do you have any understanding of whether there's a
blockage of funds? That's part of the problem.
It may be part of the problem, but that's not the only problem. The
problem is government systems. You know what they it first of all,
also make a decision which land to give. You can't build on a flood
plain anymore, so you got to build somewhere else. What decision does
that fall under? National proper housing, human settlements,
provincial human settlements, integrity, municipality, and
that's the biggest problem in system, that even you put the
money down, they won't know how to spend it, because the mechanisms
to spend it is very complicated. So it's not only a question of
money. Yes, there is some issue about money not coming through,
and money being available and not being available, that is a major
crisis. But more than that is the system and the mechanism for how
to release that money to make sure it goes to the right people at the
right time. And it's one month, it's too late. You know, the
station have started weeks ago. Because disaster by definition,
when you declare a national disaster by definition, it's
urgency, emergency and disaster, and those three things are not
applied, and that's a major the downfall of government about every
disaster. As I said, the clinics in the Eastern Cape are still not
rebuilt ended up in November last year, yeah, very quickly. What is
your tally of how many people who are still missing
from our Telly that we last had was 237, you know, and most of
those have not been found. Those were from the feedback directly
that we got from the families and from the neighbors, name, age
area, are washed away where they were, what fell on them, and
that's from what they know about. The ones that they don't know.
Nobody knows. To me, they tell is probably far more than 300 not
even beyond that.
Alright? Thank you so much for that update. Distressing news, but
important to keep it in the public eye. Gift to the givers, Director
Doctor India Suleman telling us there are 40 to 50,000 people who
are sheltering in halls and places like that. No work has begun yet
properly to find them new plots for homes to get their homes
rebuilt. This is over a month since the floods. More news in a
moment. I.