Durban - The Auditor-General Tsakani Maluleke has slammed the government’s response to the devastating floods that ravaged KwaZulu-Natal and the Eastern Cape in April and May as too slow – calling on the government to strengthen its disaster management capabilities.
Maluleke on Wednesday presented before Parliament’s Ad Hoc Joint Committee on Flood Disaster Relief and Recovery the first of a series of real-time reports on the use of the public funds allocated for the relief effort in the two provinces.
Maluleke acknowledged the government’s ongoing effort of “successfully providing social relief and commencing the rehousing and rebuilding phases with some good practices emerging”, but stressed that the overall response to the disaster had been “too slow”.
She said the impact of this slow response was that “residents and businesses in affected areas continue to experience hardship more than three months after the floods with little relief”.
Maluleke delivered an unflattering response to the government’s response to the catastrophic floods which saw over 450 people lose their lives while about 40 000 were displaced after some 12 000 homes were destroyed.
“The impact of this slow response is that residents and businesses in affected areas continue to experience hardship more than three months after the floods with little relief.
“Government’s priority should be to urgently strengthen its disaster management capacity and capabilities, as disasters such as these floods are becoming more common due to climate change,” Maluleke warned.
She also called on the government to take urgent action where delivery was slow or compromised so that much-needed relief could reach citizens already struggling to restore their livelihoods.
Among some of the key areas where such urgent action was needed, Maluleke said, was where delivery was slow or compromised.
In such instances, Maluleke said leadership must take urgent action to alleviate the hardship of affected communities and that even in times of crisis, the quality of delivery and value for money should be non-negotiable.
“Preventive controls should be implemented to avoid failure, especially in the infrastructure rebuilding phase. Government should continue to build disaster management capacity and capabilities and learn from previous disasters,” Maluleke said.
She said although the government had responded by committing to provide temporary relief measures, there was a lack of urgency in assessing damage and determining needs “particularly in the Eastern Cape where there was a limited response”.
“The damage assessments were not performed because of the backlog in addressing the impact of previous four disasters dating as far back as 2013 due to a lack of funding and co-ordination between municipalities and provincial departments,” Maluleke said.
SUNDAY TRIBUNE