HARARE City Council is calling on the central government to expand its rehabilitation strategy to include the upgrading of over 9,000 kilometres of the capital’s ageing water and sewerage pipes to provide relief to residents plagued by the water and sanitation crisis.

Harare Mayor Jacob Mafume stressed in an interview with the Zimbabwe Independent that a comprehensive rehabilitation of the city’s pipeline system was urgently needed and estimated the cost at around US$800 million.

This staggering sum exceeds the means of Harare’s approximately four million residents, who owe a total of about US$100 million in unpaid taxes.

Mafume said the government should take the lead here as it did in rehabilitating local government roads to combat the water crisis. The first two phases of the ongoing road construction projects, which are part of the national road rehabilitation programme, have already been completed.

“Just as the government has taken the lead in road rehabilitation, we need a similar program for the city’s water pipelines,” Mafume said.

“This is not something the council can do alone. We need to work with the government and other stakeholders. The estimated cost is around $800 million.”

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The Harare City Council has struggled to provide basic services for years, largely due to corruption and mismanagement. The situation for residents has become increasingly dire. Persistent water shortages have left many people exposed to deadly epidemics such as cholera and typhus.

Precious Shumba, executive director of the Harare Residents Trust, expressed deep concern about the water crisis, particularly in densely populated suburbs such as Kuwadzana, the epicentre of the recent cholera outbreak.

“Most of Harare’s suburbs have been without water for extended periods of time,” he said.

“In Kuwadzana, residents rely on boreholes and shallow wells, which are often contaminated by sewage seepage and unrepaired sewer breaks. Without timely intervention, these communities are highly vulnerable to disease outbreaks.”

Shumba urged the council to provide water tanks to prevent recurrence of cholera in densely populated areas.

Zimbabwe recently emerged from a cholera outbreak that began in February 2023 and resulted in 34,550 suspected cases and over 600 deaths. Decades of chronic underfunding of water infrastructure have put the city at risk of recurring epidemics.

While the president’s drilling program has somewhat alleviated the water crisis in some areas, water scarcity remains a significant challenge in places like Kuwadzana. Many boreholes drilled by non-governmental organizations during the last cholera pandemic have now broken, forcing residents to rely on unsafe water sources.

This dire situation has also exposed residents to other water-borne diseases such as typhoid, dysentery and diarrhea. Some of the boreholes, initially drilled with the support of the United Nations Children’s Fund, brought temporary relief but are now in a worse state.

A United Nations report suggests that one possible solution is renewed investment in water infrastructure, particularly through a better understanding of the link between water problems and the climate crisis. Although trillions of dollars are being invested globally in clean energy and low-carbon technologies, relatively little has been allocated to improving water supplies. Mafume believes the city of Harare could better address these challenges with reforms to the tax system.

He suggested adopting a similar revenue collection model to that used by the Zimbabwe Electricity Supply Authority (Zesa).

“If we implement a Zesa-like system, we can collect revenue more effectively and deal with non-payers,” Mafume said.

“This would restore the foundations of Harare. The city is owed over $100 million, including debts owed to the government and others. The beauty of Harare is that it still has the DNA of a functioning city.”

Mafume, a member of the opposition party, continues to push for these reforms and hopes to get the support needed to prevent further deterioration of Harare’s vital infrastructure.