The rain in Durban, South Africa's largest harbour city, has finally stopped, dark clouds have cleared over the lush hills, and people here are beginning to face the devastation left by the floods.
Durban resident Amanda Archipon found the bodies of her sister and 3 grandchildren on the banks of the river, but 6 relatives are still missing. With a glimmer of hope, she continued to search the ruins, hoping that it would no longer be the corpse.
In Durban's Kwazulu-Natal province (Kwana province), as of 19 April, floods had killed at least 448 people and left more than 40 missing.
NARRATOR: Unexpected rainstorms
The April days in Durban should have been pleasant, and South Africa, in the southern hemisphere, has just bid farewell to the hot and rainy summer, which is a comfortable autumn. At the beginning of April, Miah Adam, a psychologist who works from home, looked out the window at the incessant rain and didn't think much about it.
"The rainy summer is over, no one is prepared for the rain, and the local meteorological department has no warning." In an interview with the Beijing News reporter, Mia said, "It wasn't until the night of the 8th, when the rain was so heavy that even the walls of my house were washed down, that we realized how serious the rain was." ”
Mia lives in a middle- and high-class neighborhood in Durban, and only one wall collapsed in Durban is extremely fortunate. Thousands of homes in the area were destroyed by floods, roads collapsed, schools were damaged, school buildings were unusable and hospitals could not function properly. In the face of the raging floods, some people had to walk into the storm, do their best to take important items, climb up the roof to wait for rescue, and the rain did not stop.
This torrential rain has not stopped, on the 9th, 10th, 11th... It was not until the 14th that the rain in Durban stopped slightly. On the 11th alone, the rainfall in Kwana Province is about 75% of the average annual rainfall in South Africa. Some local weather stations have recorded more rainfall than ever before. Among them, the Mbaswana weather station in the north received 206.4 mm of precipitation on the 11th, which was nearly three times the previous historical record. Scientists at the University of Cape Town say Durban endured the usual month of rainfall in two days.
In April 2022, South Africa was hit by torrential rains and floods. Courtesy of respondents
These nights are sleepless nights for Mia and her family, as well as sleepless nights for many South African families. Electricity, internet and running water supplies were cut off, and during the nights of darkness, storms and rains outside the house, Mia was anxious about her friends and loved ones who could not be contacted.
"We don't know anything. Are they okay? Where is it? Is home still there? In anxiety, we couldn't sleep for several nights. We were too scared. ”
Mia's home has no power and network for two days, no running water for four consecutive days, and the supply of resources in Durban is uneven, and some areas have been out of power for more than a week.
Disaster: Kwana Province 'One of the Darkest Moments in History'
The unusually heavy rain also put South Africa into a state of national emergency on April 18. South Africa had just finished two weeks ago from a 750-day state of national disaster that had begun with COVID-19.
Nearly 500 people were killed in the floods in South Africa, and Mia lost several of her loved ones in the disaster. The Office of the Spokesperson for the Disaster Management Department of Kwana Province called it one of the "darkest moments in the province's history".
After being able to get out of the house, Mia saw the collapsed roads and bridges with her own eyes. In flood-flooded areas and rivers, bulky containers and cars float on the rivers.
In April 2022, South Africa was hit by torrential rains and floods. Courtesy of respondents
The province's governor, Zicarara, said that preliminary statistics as of the 17th show that a total of 8329 houses were damaged in the flood, 3937 houses were completely destroyed, and 13556 families were affected. Most of the affected areas were out of power, and some areas had insufficient water supply.
"A lot of people lost everything after this disaster." Mia said.
Boniswa Shangase lives in an informal residential community north of Durban. At 10 p.m. on the 11th, a mudslide brought by a torrential rain swept her house down the hillside, and she was able to escape by climbing out of the window, but now, she was at a loss for the rest of her life.
"I couldn't eat all day and I didn't know what to do next." In an interview with the BBC, she said: "I am already homeless. ”
The floods wreaked havoc on infrastructure such as water, electricity, railways and telecommunications, with reuters reporting damage to more than ZAR 10 billion (US$675 million).
What worries Mia is the impact of the floods on Durban next. Durban has many coal power plants that were damaged in the floods, and Durban's power supply facilities may not operate for a long time. At the same time, until the 21st of the Beijing News reporter, Mia's home still had only 12 hours of running water supply a day. Durban's water supply system was severely damaged in the disaster, and many areas still have no running water supply. They face a serious water crisis.
In the aftermath of the floods, rescuers and volunteers waded through muddy rivers and searched for the remaining 40 or so missing people among the rubble of destroyed houses. Mia said that her house is close to the beach and many people are helping with the cleanup work by the beach. "The tide washed the bodies all up the coast, and inside there was the body of a baby that looked only 3 months old."
In April 2022, after the floods in South Africa, rescuers were conducting search and rescue operations. Courtesy of respondents
South Africa has deployed 10,000 Wehrmacht troops to the affected areas to help people rebuild their homes, and South African Finance Minister Enoch Godongana also told local television that Kwana Province can now use 1 billion South African rand (about $68.3 million) of emergency relief funds.
The governor of Kwana Province, Zicarara, also said on the 17th that in the past few days, the government has been committed to rescuing the affected people and counting the losses. Police and the military also sent helicopters to participate in the disaster relief.
Hidden danger: Durban's housing crisis
The port of Durban is considered the most prosperous port in the sub-Saharan African continent, and in 2009, While Officials in Durban were preparing for the following year's World Cup, hundreds of residents were moved from tin houses near the city centre to flood-prone areas in the south, according to The New York Times. They don't want tourists coming for the World Cup to see the humble shacks.
The new residence is a compact group of low houses made of drywalls, with no electricity, hidden between noisy highways and rivers. In an interview with The New York Times, Themba Lushaba recalled that officials acknowledged to them the flood risk of the new residence, but also promised they would move into permanent housing within three months.
After 13 years and four devastating floods, Simba, 34, still hasn't been able to wait for the promised permanent housing. The April flood was the most painful one he had ever experienced, and in the darkness, the water spilled over to his waist, and eventually he fled with his neighbors to a distant field, shivering all night under an umbrella.
On April 17, local time, near Durban, South Africa, a child injured by a flood, his home collapsed due to the flood. Figure/IC photo
Simba's suffering has brought us to the housing crisis, a long-standing social problem in South Africa, in addition to natural disasters, which is also an important reason for the high death toll in this flood. The floods in South Africa highlighted a long-neglected reality: protecting people in the face of natural disasters is equally important to address social and environmental issues.
Scientists say rainfall has steadily increased off the southeast coast of Africa, and Durban may face more extreme weather phenomena after Durban, which is difficult to reverse in the short term. In addition to mitigating climate change, South Africa's top priority is to address the housing problems caused by poverty, high unemployment and inequality.
Durban's informal neighbourhoods are extremely rudimentary, with many fragile tin houses buried in ruins in the aftermath of the floods. Mia said these informal communities were the hardest hit by the floods and mudslides.
On the 17th, there were many protests in Kwana Province, and the protesters said that they had lived in informal residential communities for too long, and the government had not built houses for them for a long time, and now it did not provide enough support for them who lost their homes.
Informal settlements are a product of apartheid in South Africa during colonialism in the last century. In 1913, South Africa enacted the Aboriginal Lands Act, which legally deprived blacks of their lands, and a large number of blacks were expelled by the white government and had to settle on the edge of the town, which was a slum in Durban, which had always been plagued by mudslides and floods, and was also a breeding ground for violent crime. Most of the people who now live in these communities are black.
Hope Magidimisha-Chipungu, associate professor of town and planning at the University of Kwazulu-Natal, said about a quarter of Durban's population currently lives in informal residential communities.
In a social context where unemployment is at least 35 per cent, South Africa's low-income brackets are forced to settle in these communities, where they cannot find jobs or more stable permanent housing, and many find landed places to build tin shacks. In Durban, the houses are built on low-lying valleys along rivers or loose dirt on steep slopes, making them vulnerable to torrential rains.
The way out: Post-disaster reconstruction needs to be broken
On the evening of the 18th, South African President Ramaphosa acknowledged the fatal weakness of the South African government's housing policy in a speech, saying that in the next disaster relief, houses will be built in suitable areas and measures will be taken to protect the residents of these areas to avoid similar tragedies from happening again. Now, the South African government is already building some rudimentary makeshift prefabricated homes for some 40,000 displaced people.
This is not the first time the South African government has made similar commitments. In June 2017, a massive storm hit Cape Town, South Africa's legislative capital, and its Western Cape province, killing and injuring several others. In April 2019, flooding from days of rain killed at least 70 people in South Africa.
Mbublelo Baloyi, a spokesman for the housing department of Quana Province, said reconstruction efforts were slowed by the complexity of the process of government contracts required to build new homes after the 2017 floods. In 2019, areas still licking wounds in the 2017 floods were again flattened by floods, and the South African central government stepped in and simplified the process.
On April 16, local time, Durban, South Africa, the local area was hit by torrential rains and floods, and the houses were seriously damaged. Figure/IC photo
Despite commitments, South African local governments are still falling short to address the devastation of climate change through economic and social development, and local planning authorities are unable to keep up with the growing demand for housing.
The "complex process" obstacles to post-flood housing reconstruction are not unique.
In 2018, the South African NGO Development Action Group (DAG) and an informal residential community submitted a redevelopment initiative to the City of Cape Town, but never made significant progress, in response to the need for the nearly 12 hectares of land to be used to "reduce density". Local media commented that "reducing density" is nothing more than another way of saying that people are being evicted.
In 2020, the South African Development Action Team proposed to release three underutilized military lands for the construction of residential housing, but the South African Ministry of Defence said it was using the three lands, and the reason for "national defense" was naturally unmistakable.
While citing these failed attempts, two members of the South African Development Action Team, Daily Maverick, a local media outlet, commented that south Africa's housing problem now faces a new reality - "there are some regulations and regulations that need to be followed, and many developments cannot be carried out".
When managing local housing in South Africa, there are more regulations subconsciously put in place to control and ensure that politicians can provide decent shelter for residents, but this has created a political culture of apathy, fear and corruption, with the public sector underwhelming to provide better services.
"In all these cases, our government agencies are lost and courageous on the way forward. Instead of focusing on providing services to residents and addressing housing priorities, the process has become lengthy and politicized. The article emphasizes that to solve the housing crisis in South Africa, "what is needed is an honest politician who does not abuse his power to mislead society." ”
In the face of the increasingly frequent extreme weather phenomena, the South African government cannot really put numerous housing plans into action, solve the housing crisis, or really wake up from the nightmare of flooding. Hope Magidimisha-Chipungu said, "If measures are not taken to reduce the impact of future flooding, then the port city of Durban is heading for a very bleak and catastrophic future." ”
Beijing News reporter Hou Wuting
Edited by Chen Jing, proofread by Liu Jun