WASHINGTON (dpa-AFX) – After weeks of a collapse in the drinking water supply in the poverty-stricken US city of Jackson, the authorities have given the all-clear for the time being. “We can now announce that we are providing the city of Jackson with clean water again,” said Mississippi Governor Tate Reeves on Thursday (local time). Jackson is the state capital and has around 150,000 residents. The people there have been suffering since August with serious problems with the water supply and at times complete failures. After heavy rain and flooding, the city’s already ailing water treatment plant collapsed – the population was asked to boil the water to kill bacteria.
Mississippi is considered the poorest state in the USA. Downtown Jackson has largely died out – numerous people have moved to the suburbs. Whites in particular left the city decades ago – the population now consists of around 80 percent blacks, and a quarter of them live in poverty. It has been particularly difficult for these people to get clean drinking water in the past few weeks. Civil rights activists accuse the authorities of having neglected the city for decades because there has been no investment in the maintenance of important infrastructure.
Reeves did not rule out that problems could arise again. “It’s possible, but I pray it’s not inevitable that there will be more disruption,” the governor said. “We cannot predict exactly what can go wrong in the future with such a broken system.”/nau/DP/zb