Business partners Sean ‘Diddy’ Combs and Mark Wahlberg have teamed up with Eminem and Wiz Khalifa to become the latest stars to offer up clean water supplies to thirsty residents of Flint, Michigan.
Locals have had to rely on bottled supplies since 2014, after officials decided to draw water from a river which has since tested positive for lead.
The uproar has prompted a number of stars to step up and donate to the city, with superstar Cher leading the charge by uniting with bosses at Icelandic Glacial to provide over 181,000 bottles of water to the city’s residents last week (ends22Jan16).
Rappers Meek Mill and Big Sean and rockers Pearl Jam followed suit, and now Combs and Wahlberg have ordered a shipment of one million bottles of their fitness water brand AQUAhydrate to be delivered to city residents, with the help of donations from Khalifa and Michigan native Eminem.
The first shipment of 5,000 cases is set to arrive on Wednesday (27Jan16) from the Los Angeles-based company, which Combs and Wahlberg invested in in 2013. They have also pledged to continue sending supplies until Flint’s water crisis is resolved.
Meanwhile, rocker Jack White has also started a fundraising drive via his Third Man Records on CrowdRise – the same platform used by Big Sean and Pearl Jam to boost their donations – giving fans the chance to win big prizes in exchange for monetary gifts. And U.S. chat show host Jimmy Fallon has revealed he is sending a $10,000 (£6,670) cheque to officials at Community Foundation Greater Flint to aid locals.
Matt Damon has also expressed outrage at the way the situation has been handled, backing calls from fellow celebrities like Cher for Michigan Governor Rick Snyder to step down and face prosecution.
“At the very least he should resign. At the very least,” Damon told The Daily Beast. “Listen, everybody’s entitled to a fair trial in the United States of America, but that man should get one. And soon. That’s just my personal opinion.”
The Hollywood star, who founded a charity called Water.org to provide safe water and sanitation to deprived communities across the globe, even compared the situation in Flint to the problems in Ethiopia.
“We were in Ethiopia together six or seven years ago and this Flint thing has reminded me of this time in this little village where these kids were collecting this water that was about the colour of chocolate milk,” he told Britain’s Sky News. “Kind of like the water in Flint, actually. And they were filling up these little bottles with it to take it to school.”
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