Big business guzzled water as Cape Town’s dam levels plummeted
Years after the threat of Day Zero, it turns out that while households were blamed for over-excessive water use, big industrial users were given little more than a slap on the wrist for their significant water consumption.
CCIJ members Steve Kretzmann and Raymond Joseph report on Cape Town’s top ten water users, who sucked up billions of liters of drinking water for business as the city’s biggest dam, Theewatersloof, edged toward an unusable 10 percent.
Member News
Raymond Joseph
CCIJ South African Hub Leader Ray Joseph was named the second place winner of the Most Resilient Journalist Award from Free Press Unlimited. During deliberation, the jury mentioned:
Raymond Joseph is an investigative journalist that spent three years uncovering abuse of funds from the South African Lottery by political actors. As a result he and his news outlet were threatened with criminal charges. Joseph was reported to the National Intelligence Service, and he and his family were attacked on social media as well as in public statements by senior lottery officials. The jury commends Mr. Joseph for his tenacity in reporting from areas where government accountability is lacking, providing the public with in-depth research stories under difficult circumstances.
Learn more about Free Press Unlimited here.
Sonja Angula and Brezhnev Malaba
Sonja Angula and Brezhnev Malaba have both received grants from OSISA to work on contributions to CCIJ’s H2O Fail project.
Brezhnev’s story: An analytical feature that investigates Harare’s rapidly deteriorating water supply crisis. The story will have a strong focus on the lived experiences of ordinary people and how they are affected by the water situation and outline the challenges in water supply as well as explore the solutions.
Sonja’s story: An investigation about grape farming on the Namibian border with South Africa, a dry and arid semi desert area. The story will investigate the living conditions of farm workers, health issues as a result of lack of clean water and sanitation and what is happening to the funds being allocated: a problem of implementation, corruption or other issues hampering the process.