Bulawayo City Council (BCC) authorities have engaged the African Development Bank (AfDB) to assist with funds to improve water provision from Nyamandlovu as a short-term solution to the crisis.
The development follows pressure from residents for council to urgently resolve the prolonged water challenges in the city.
Bulawayo’s water supply shortages have worsened with most suburbs going dry for weeks, forcing residents to resort to unsafe sources which poses a serious health hazard.
Mayor David Coltart said in efforts to address the water challenges, he held a meeting with the AfDB last week on the Nyamandlovu water project.
“Regarding the water situation, we have identified that the key thing to address is the Nyamandlovu project. I met with the African Development Bank last week to try and raise the necessary funding,” he said.
“We have written to the Zimbabwe National Water Authority to ask them to advise on the borehole pumps that need to be repaired. This of course belongs to Zinwa and is beyond our control in that we are reliant on Zinwa.”
Coltart said the Gwayi-Shangani project would provide a long-term solution to the city’s water woes.
“I have identified Gwayi-Shangani as a good medium to long-term project. The cost of water will be five times what Bulawayo residents currently pay for water and so it's unaffordable in the short to medium term,” he said.
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“All our engineers advise that we need to duplicate the pipeline from Insiza to Ncema treatment works and duplicate the pipeline from Mtshabezi Dam to Ncema and double the size of the Tuli Reservoir.”
Coltart said he raised the issue in the meeting with AfDB officials.
“I have also raised it with government, but the uptake is slow. But we are at least identifying what needs to be done and starting to make the plans necessary,” he said.
Meanwhile, Bulawayo United Residents Association chairperson Winos Dube told Southern Eye that the water shortages were a thorn in the flesh for the residents and their expectations were always high.
“It cannot be a matter of saying now that we have a new mayor and councillors in place, this will be over. We have always had these promises but continuedto cry over the water problem in Bulawayo. We expect the relevant authorities to find ways and solutions to the water shortage problem in the city.
“On September 28, my executive and I paid a courtesy call to the new mayor. We spoke strongly about this issue of water challenges in Bulawayo.
“In his response, he sounded like they were looking at some immediate term solutions that can be put in place whileat least we were waiting for the long-term solution.”
Dube said it was the residents’ expectation that those solutions could turn into practical actions.
“We are very much concerned this time around when there is an outbreak of cholera, where we are saying honestly, something needs to be done if we are to contain this outbreak vis-à-vis the issue of water. Water is very key during this time when we have this outbreak,” he said.
“We, therefore, make a strong appeal to our local authority to try the level best by availing water bowsers to areas where there is no tap water resuscitating all the boreholes around the people so that they can access water.”
