Glen View residents drinking contaminated water
By Tichaona Sibanda
27 June 2007

The water crisis in Harare has become so desperate that over 500 families based at the Amalinda plots on the outskirts of Glen View are knowingly drinking contaminated water from the Mukuvisi river.

Raw sewage from a broken water pipe in Msasa has been flowing into the Mukuvisi which meanders down the capital’s south western suburbs, passing through the vicinity of Amalinda plots.

Precious Shumba, the Combined Harare Residents Association information officer, said the threat of disease outbreak in the capital has reached ‘red alert’ meaning a cholera outbreak is imminent. In other areas residents with transport are buying water from the city centre or getting it from relatives that still have water supplies.

‘At Amalinda plots we are talking of people who were displaced by Operation Murambatsvina. These are people who are still struggling to fork out a living and they have been telling us they have no choice but to use the contaminated water because they have no other place to get it,’ Shumba said.

Residents of Glen View, Glen Norah, Msasa Park, Budiriro and Kuwadzana have been without water since last Friday after a water pump burst. The Harare city council has failed to restore water supplies citing lack of resources and foreign currency to repair the damages.

CHRA is worried about the implications of a potential disease outbreak of diarrhoea and dysentery. Two years ago following a similar water problem, an outbreak of cholera claimed the lives of 26 residents in the capital.

‘The danger with a similar recurrence is that there would be no nurses and doctors to treat victims because of the strike. An outbreak now would be catastrophic,’ said Shumba.

Of concern to CHRA is that the Ministry of Health and Child Welfare and the Ministry of Water and Infrastructural Development have remained quiet when they should be taking urgent measures to address the pending disaster before lives are lost again.