Press Kit
Short Synopsis
Capturing Water brings fresh insights into activism and hope. You will meet working class activists, bravely mobilising against a city that restricts their water without the dignity of discussion; an activist farmer litigating to stop city plans to cement over an aquifer that provides affordable food to thousands of people, and a suburban activist tirelessly engaging a city that makes decades of empty promises to stop the sewage flowing into life-giving wetlands
Long Synopsis
In 2018, Cape Town narrowly averted completely running out of drinking water. The dry taps crisis, termed ‘Day Zero’, followed an extended drought. In a country sitting 29 th on the list of water scarce places in the world, this became a ghastly harbinger of things to come. In the wake of Day Zero the city council committed to take urgent action to protect the supply of water by enforcing a policy of limited access.
Capturing Water follows the unfolding fight, led by working class activist, Faeza Meyer, to overturn Cape Town’s city council’s water cuts offs. For Faeza, the city’s strategy of cutting water to households that ‘over use’ is punitive to the Cape’s many poor and crowded dwellings. As the film follows Faeza’s quest to build a movement around water rights, the contradictions faced by a liberal city Mayor who has been pressured to self- finance major water and sanitation infrastructural spend to augment its water supply, are unpeeled.
The film features two other protagonists, both of whom are also victims of market led solutions to the water crisis. Caroline Marx is part of a community living next to a lagoon that emits a terrible stench due to poor maintenance and sewage spills. This has killed aquatic life and forced closure of the lagoon and surrounding beaches. The film follows Caroline’s use of environmental legislation to demand accountability over the sewage crisis.
Nazeer Sonday is a famer and campaigner who has been defending the city’s ground water. He successfully fends off big housing developers who are eyeing prime recharge area of the largest aquifer. Nazeer’s story takes us to the food-water nexus and the
symbiosis between land and water rights, augmenting the short fall of fresh water and the polluting nature of chemical fertiliser used by large scale intensive agriculture.
As the three protagonists take on various aspects of the city council’s mistreatment of the water cycle, what is starkly revealed is the role that a full cost recovery market approach to critical services plays in maintaining South Africa’s water crisis, alongside its place as the most unequal country in the world.
Directors Biography
Short Resume
Rehad Desai is a Producer/Director who runs his own company Uhuru Productions. Following his return from political exile in the UK Rehad worked as a trade union organiser, a health and safety/media officer for a chemical workers union and a Director of a HIV prevention NGO. In 1997 he completed his Masters Degree in Social History at the University of the Witwatersrand. Rehad then entered the TV and film industry as a current affairs journalist, and soon after moved on to focus his energy on historical and socio -political documentary film.
In 2009 he completed a post graduate diploma in documentary through Eurodoc. He has produced over 20 documentaries, many directed by himself that have been broadcast internationally, accepted into numerous festivals and been received with critical acclaim. His last film Miners Shot Down has won local and international critical acclaim garnering over 25 prizes including the Taco Keiper award for investigative journalism and an International Emmy for best documentary. He is also a well known social justice activist that chairs the Human Rights Media Trust and the South Africa Screen Federation
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Endorsements
Across cultures, over borders, and throughout history, water is used as a symbol for life. Yet its relationship to human existence extends beyond our biological necessities. Water soaks deeply into our economic, social, and political realities and because of its indispensable and irreplaceable presence within civilization, water can also come to be a symbol for power. Capturing Water skillfully tells this story and exposes the violent realities of water scarcity, a direct consequence of neoliberal policies and practices, compounded by the impacts of climate change. It simultaneously centres the unwavering spirit of women and communities: from their personal struggles to their political organising work at the forefront of the fight for water justice. The film powerfully amplifies their vision to see water as part of a commons: available to all, with equitable distribution within and across populations, protected from misuse and harm to ensure its availability for future generations.
Shereen Essof is a feminist popular educator and organiser with a long history of working in and with social movements and cultural collectives. She currently serves as Executive Director of JASS, a global feminist movement strengthening organisation.
“Desai has produced a masterful documentary, which tells a universal story of neoliberal injustice through the lens of the Cape Town water crisis. Beautifully filmed and amplifying the voices of the African Water Commons Collective, among others, it traces a logic starting with colonialism and ending with the commodification of water on global futures markets. It should prove an important contribution to popular education on the connections across some of the biggest questions of our times.”
Fiona Dove, Director, Transnational Institute, Amsterdam
“This film investigates the massive challenge of fair and just access to water in South Africa, and the degradation of our water resources, in the context of increasing demand for limited water supplies and changing rainfall patterns due to climate change. Set in Cape Town, the issues pertain across the country, highlighting the stark inequalities of life in South Africa, in this case through the lens of access to water. While those with money have swimming pools and well-watered gardens, in poor communities, access to water remains a daily struggle, even for those living in wealthy cities like Cape Town. These inequalities do not have to exist. They are the result of the society that we have created. We can change them. We can provide a decent life for all in South Africa. This film is a clarion call for us to take action.”
Barbara Schreiner is Executive Director of the Water Integrity Network. She has over 20 years’ experience in water management in developing countries, with a focus on good governance and addressing poverty, inequality, gender and other forms of social and economic marginalisation.
Capturing Water brings fresh insights into activism and hope. You will meet working class activists, bravely mobilising against a city that restricts their water without the dignity of discussion; an activist farmer litigating to stop city plans to cement over an aquifer that provides affordable food to thousands of people, and a suburban activist tirelessly engaging a city that makes decades of empty promises to stop the sewage flowing into life-giving wetlands.
Alana Potter is a former IRC programme officer. She has worked for among others WaterAid, End Water Poverty and is currently working with the Equality Collective.
“Capturing Water offers a very timely and insightful commentary on the production of urban water crises. In 2018, Cape Town grabbed international headlines by declaring it was on the brink of running out of water. Featuring frontline organizers in communities most impacted by the city’s decisions in the aftermath of the day zero crisis, the film asks poignant questions about who benefits and who is excluded from contemporary climate adaptation strategies. “
Meera Karunananthan is a board member of the Blue Planet Project and a founding member of the global network, the People’s ‘s Water Forum.
