South Africa runs dry as largest city hit by unprecedented water crisis
For two weeks, Tsholofelo Moloi has been among thousands of South Africans lining up for water as the country's largest city, Johannesburg, confronts an unprecedented collapse of its water system affecting millions of people.
Residents rich and poor have never seen a shortage of this severity. While hot weather has shrunk reservoirs, crumbling infrastructure after decades of neglect is also largely to blame. The public's frustration is a danger sign for the ruling African National Congress, whose comfortable hold on power since the end of apartheid in the 1990s faces its most serious challenge in an election this year.
A country already famous for its hourslong electricity shortages is now adopting a term called “watershedding” — the practice of going without water, from the term loadshedding, or the practice of going without power.
The general view on this seems to be that incompetence and corruption are the underlying causes, another symptom of neglected South African infrastructure.
Taking a wider view, it does emphasise how damaging the slow grind of endemic incompetence can be. We in the UK may moan about having to drive around numerous potholes in our roads, but this is a symptom too. Endemic incompetence took root here some time ago and voting probably won't change that.
The last major UK reservoir was built at Carsington in Derbyshire in 1991.
8 comments:
Yes , growing incompetence here gives us oldies a dreadful sense of foreboding.
Tammly - I agree, it certainly gives me a sense of foreboding.
A country where having the correct family and social connections mean more than talent. Where positive discrimination beats merit in the employment stakes. Where investment is diverted to special interest non productive projects rather than for the general good. Where obvious injustices (Sub Post Masters, Silent Public Praying, having the wrong graffiti on your wall, being part of the wrong public protest, even being of the wrong tribe or race, etc. etc.) are just part of life.
Maybe South Africa is the same.
Doonhamer - ha ha, very good, but now my sense of foreboding is even stronger.
Not just endemic incompetence but (to steal a phrase) systematic incompetence. It's not enough to remove incompetent people (even when they are widespread) if the systems they work within are not geared up to use competence between the systems.
So, as an example, there are plenty of competent people working in the NHS, and matters would be improved if the incompetent ones were weeded out. But as long as the NHS does not work well with other systems (like social care, computer systems, NICE, government departments, other hospitals in other 'trusts') you have to add more and more people just to keep things running as well as they do presently - systematic incompetence.
So fascists got the trains running on time, and the Boers got the water running.
Apartheid was a dreadful thing, but they should have asked where the pumping-station plans were before they started reallocating resources and top jobs.
DJ - I sometimes wonder if our systems generally require too few competent people. Combined with too many qualified mediocrities who expect to do white collar work and we have significant numbers prepared to promote and value systematic incompetence. They should be doing routine clerical work, but there isn't enough of it and what there is may soon disappear.
Sam - I once watched a video of a Chinese engineer berating people in another African country for not maintaining colonial era infrastructure such as the railway. "You haven't done what was necessary," he said.
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