Tobruk water crisis said to be imminent

Tobruk’s sole working water treatment plant is on the verge of collapse meaning that some 400,000 people could in the town could soon be without safe drinking water. The town’s problems are nothing new. It has long been short of water.But since 2015 outdated and poorly maintained equipment has been threatening disaster. The steam desalination plant is currently working at only ten percent capacity.But now the boss of the water plant Fatalla Selim is warning that he is running out of chemicals needed to make water potable. Selim told the Turkish broadcaster TRT that for over a year he had been pressing for funds to buy new supplies but, he said,  “no one is listening”.Tobruk municipality has been looking at digging new wells and even building a brand new desalination plant able to produce 150,000 cubic metres of water daily. But with no central funding and no way to raise the money itself, such schemes have remained pie in the sky.