Knysna rises from the ashes for Christmas
Resident Gill Marcus helps smooth flow of money into the town
● As Reserve Bank governor she declined a salary hike. Now Gill Marcus’s altruism is being directed to her home town, Knysna.
She is helping to turn a disaster story into a Christmas fairytale.
Marcus, who stepped down as the country’s top banker in 2015, nearly lost her home in Belvedere on the Knysna lagoon in the June wildfire that destroyed about 1 000 homes along the Garden Route.
She has joined some of the country’s top business minds to resolve a financial bottleneck delaying vital rebuilding projects in the area.
Last month the group registered a donation “fund”, chaired by Marcus, to co-ordinate private sector donations and help start the Garden Route Rebuild Initiative. As residents gear up for the holidays, money that had been tied up by red tape is now flowing into rebuilding projects.
Instead of a blackened, scorched-earth Christmas, the town finally has some festive cheer thanks to the private-public partnership, touted as the biggest of its kind.
“In the country as a whole this is a unique experiment,” Knysna municipal manager Kam Chetty told the Sunday Times.
“If it works, and I think it will work well, then we are on the cusp of a new development model.
“We have someone like Gill Marcus who can phone all the CEOs and the banks to ask for money. They have a lot more credibility than we do. We have an enormous amount of really smart CEOs with extensive networks in the private sector. If we pull all of those people together we have a phenomenal machine to raise money and bring in new thinking and intellect to jointly plan.”
Ironically, the devastating fire had forged a commitment to rejuvenate the town and make it more inclusive, Chetty said.
He said town planners hoped the outpouring of goodwill during the crisis could be harnessed to improve the local economy and bolster employment.
Miss Universe helps too
Other retired business people involved in rebuilding Knysna include South African Breweries human resources boss Johann Nel and former Nedcor chief executive Richard Laubscher.
The long list of high-profile activists includes newly crowned Miss Universe DemiLeigh Nel-Peters, whose home town of Sedgefield was also ravaged by the massive fire. Nel-Peters helped raise about R500 000 for disaster relief.
But it is the many more anonymous donors and volunteers who are largely responsible for transforming a natural disaster into a triumph of citizen action.
More than six months after the fire the volunteers are still distributing basic provisions, including gift packs, to affected people in the township.
“It will take at least another year until people are all back on their feet,” said Bruce Bartie, who runs a charity drive with his wife from their cluttered lounge.
“There is a perception around the country that Knysna is full of wealthy people. But a lot of the aid coming in is from people who know that there are lower- and lower-middle-class people here who have been left largely destitute.”
A case in point is Mike Parkin, of Elandskraal between Knysna and Sedgefield, who lost four of the five buildings on his hilltop property. This week he was the emotional recipient of an “extreme makeover: home edition” from nonprofit group Rebuild Eden Sedgefield, which built him a new house and furnished it.
“I have been here 30 years, so just having something back in place makes a big difference,” said Parkin, cradling a donated Christmas tree. “There’s lot of charity. It’s a good start.”
Rebuild Eden has so far provided several total makeovers and processed tons of donations, from organic liquid fertiliser to sex toys. Volunteer Lesley Langham said further assistance was needed in the form of tools.
Other donor groups include the local Rotary Club, which channelled numerous donations — many of them anonymous, including an individual pledge of R50 000 — to those in need.
“We’ve helped about 292 families and 21 businesses,” said Knysna Rotary president Doug Emanuel.
Parts of the town still resemble building sites and many burnt-out houses remain. An estimated third of all affected homeowners have sold their properties since the fire, while others are still waiting for insurance settlements.
However, hotels and restaurants were this week gearing up for the holiday season, with most reporting no discernible slump in bookings.
In a statement this week, the Garden Route Rebuild Initiative outlined its strategy to fix the town, which includes focusing on tourism, light manufacturing and inclusive urban development.
Langham said she had been amazed by the outpouring of generosity from rich and poor alike.
“We had two little kids give us a box with something like a tin of baked beans inside. But on the outside they had stapled a plastic bank bag with their R5 pocket money inside,” said Langham.
“The amount of tears we’ve shed here, from sadness to joy, is just unbelievable.”