Cape Town - Community leaders in local communities are calling on the City to make clear its position on providing emergency disaster relief kits to residents whose shacks have burned down.
This comes as the City revealed in a statement that it had rebuilt over 800 shacks for Masiphumelele fire victims who lost their homes in a catastrophic fire in December last year.
Provincial ANC Finance and Economic opportunities spokesperson Nomi Nkondlo accused the City of being disingenuous by initially stating that they have no funds to assist fire victims in need.
Delft community leader Dineo Masui said that currently, 11 families were struggling to rebuild their lives after their homes burned down.
Masui said while she wanted to assist the families she had hit a stumbling block as the City had told her they have no funds to assist people in this regard.
This was denied by the the City, which said that due to misinformation residents in local communities are under the impression that the City is refusing to assist them, based on the fact that they had done so in the past, but however it was only done on behalf of organisations that provide humanitarian aid.
Disaster Risk Management spokesperson Charlotte Powell said: “The South African Social Service Agency (Sassa) is the responsible body for directly activating non-government organisations in times of emergency and/or disaster relief.
“In 2017, Sassa changed the provision of humanitarian relief in times of disaster and/or emergency relief. Before this change, the arrangement was that the Disaster Risk Management Centre (DRMC) would activate NGOs to provide humanitarian relief, such as meals and blankets to victims of an emergency/disaster.
“Currently, in the event of an emergency and/or disaster where humanitarian relief is required, DRMC has to notify Sassa of such requests. Sassa in turn, now directly activates the NGOs to provide the required relief. The change came about after Sassa reassessed its policies and procedures in funding service providers that provide social relief to disaster victims,” said Powell.
Sassa spokesperson Shivani Wahab said: “In the event of a disaster, the City provides an incident report and give us a list of affected persons. Our team at the Disaster Unit will then conduct a site visit as per policy. Following the site visit, an incident report is compiled and sent through for approval for the activation of a service provider to provide disaster relief.
“Note that in the case of persons who are waiting for relief interventions, Sassa is dependent on the City for information. Activation of relief to those affected is possible once detailed information is provided to Sassa.”
Cape Argus