Lack of political will fans Northern Cape fires
12 October 2021
It is a complete disgrace that while vast tracts of land were damaged and animals died in a fire that raged since Saturday in and around the Frances Baard municipal district, cosmetic changes to Kimberley ahead of President Cyril Ramaphosa’s visit yesterday, were more important for the government than helping to fight the fires.
Like with the previous fires in the regions, thousands of hectares of land have been razed and untold amounts of wildlife killed and injured, as the flames stretched from outside Kimberley to Warrenton and in the direction of Barkly West.
While all this was going on, EPWP workers and municipal officials from Sol Plaatje tried to give parts of the city, where President Ramaphosa would be visiting, a quick facelift, ferrying loads of rubbish away on lorries and getting to work on long-broken infrastructure.
All this superficial ANC activity and yet neither local nor provincial government could integrate their services to ensure that lorry drivers were availed to take out the water truck and fire engine that remained parked at Frances Baard District municipal office (see pic here).