S Africa ministers to the front as flood effort stutters

DURBAN: South Africa’s government Tuesday sought to reassure a worried public about efforts to help the east coast, where millions remained without water more than a week after deadly storms pounded the region.

Following up a declaration late Monday of a national state of disaster, President Cyril Ramaphosa dispatched top ministers to the city of Durban and KwaZulu-Natal (KZN) province, where at least 443 people have died and 40,000 are homeless.

“These floods are the worst floods that we have ever seen in living memory,” Nkosazana DlaminiZuma, the minister in charge of disaster management, told a news conference.

“The impact of these floods are well beyond the province,” she said. Health Minister Joe Phaahla visited the Prince Mshiyeni regional hospital, where for the past week, patients have used buckets to bathe and flush toilets.

“The main challenge there is water,” he told AFP. “The main supply from the municipality is cut off.” Normally the hospital sees 2,000 patients a day. The minister said workers were repairing cisterns to store water delivered by tankers.

About 100 residents of the devastated Umlazi neighbourhood waited outside the hospital, fearful that their medical records had been lost in the storm. Several hospitals reported that files had been lost or damaged, raising fears among patients with chronic conditions.

Pravin Gordhan, the minister for public enterprises, met with officials at the Port of Durban — the second-largest container port in Africa. During the height of the floods last week, containers were tossed about like building blocks. As the waters subsided, key roads connecting the port to the rest of the country sustained heavy damage.

The problems have created bottlenecks for around 13,000 truckers who daily have to get goods to and from the port, which serves a vast stretch of Africa as far as the Democratic Republic of Congo.