The government has declined to declare Bulawayo a water disaster area, attributing the city’s water crisis to mismanagement by the local council rather than climate factors.
Minister of Justice, Legal, and Parliamentary Affairs Ziyambi Ziyambi, who also leads government business in Parliament, said on Wednesday that councils in both Bulawayo and the capital, Harare, have failed to serve their residents effectively over the past two decades.
According to CITE, Bulawayo has faced a severe raw water shortage for many years, a situation that residents and local leaders believe demands urgent intervention.
The Bulawayo City Council (BCC) recently announced that the city’s supply dams are operating at just 29% capacity and has called on the central government to declare Bulawayo a water disaster area.
However, in response to questions from legislators during Wednesday’s parliamentary session, Ziyambi asserted that the circumstances do not justify a national disaster declaration. Said Ziyambi:
We have refrained from declaring a disaster where we feel there is mismanagement by our local authorities. The majority of our local authorities, including Harare, even have their billing systems in shambles.
If there are local authorities that should not be broke, they are Harare and Bulawayo, but for the past 20 or so years, they have failed in their roles as city leaders.
He said before the government could consider declaring a disaster, it needed to address the administrative failures of the council. Added Ziyambi:
We are now working to upgrade the systems because they have failed. When we feel that we need help after dealing with our local authorities, then we can act, but for now, we do not believe there is an issue that requires a national disaster declaration.
Ziyambi’s response came after Bulawayo MP Thokozani Khupe implored the government to declare the city a water shortage area this could help Bulawayo access external funding and bring a permanent resolution to the crisis.
Khupe also pointed out that water from boreholes in the Nyamandlovu aquifer, a critical water source for Bulawayo, has dropped to about five megalitres per day, against a potential of 26.
In response, Ziyambi claimed the government was committed to solving Bulawayo’s water problems, saying that once the Gwayi-Shangani project is complete, it will have enough water for its needs. Said Ziyambi:
What we have realised is that the current water shortages in Bulawayo are not due to insufficient raw water, but because the water reticulation system is outdated.
We have agreed that instead of scattering projects across the country, we will focus on one area and refurbish it completely before moving on to the next.
We are going to start with Bulawayo because we need to replace all the pipes and redo the water reticulation system to ensure continuous water delivery.
This is not a project that will be completed overnight, but we have committed to starting with Bulawayo, even before the completion of the Gwayi-Shangani project.
Last week the Bulawayo City Council temporarily discontinued water supplies to all city areas except for the city centre and industrial site, due to low reservoir levels.
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