Disease outbreaks feared as water authority moves to cut supply

Plans by the Zimbabwe National Water Authority (ZINWA) to disconnect water services to all towns owing it money could trigger widespread outbreaks of disease, which the health ministry may not have the capacity to control, warned Zimbabwe's Directorate of Disease Prevention and Control. The directorate, part of the Ministry of Health and Child Welfare, said there was a danger of diseases spreading to neighbouring countries and blossoming into regional epidemics as people moved from one country to another. Dr Stanley Midzi, director in the Centre for Disease Prevention and Control in the ministry, said they were already overstretched in terms of human and material resources and funding. ZINWA, a statutory body charged with managing the country's water resources and catchment areas, announced this week that it would disconnect water services to all towns in arrears. The collective debt owed to ZINWA runs into hundreds of millions of Zimbabwe dollars. The exercise was set to begin this week in Matabeleland South, where a total of six towns including Gwanda, the provincial capital, owe ZINWA over Zim $100 million (about US $122,977) in unpaid water tariffs. The other towns are: Beitbridge, on the border with South Africa; Plumtree, on the border of Botswana; Esigodini, an agricultural and district capital about 50 km southwest of Bulawayo; Kezi and Maphisa on the edge of the vast Matopos National Park; and Filabusi, the district capital for Insiza constituency. Tommy Rosen, the ZINWA manager for Umzingwane Catchment area which supplies water to the towns, warned that only a full payment of debts would result in reconnection of the water supply. Although it was not possible to get a credit breakdown for each of the towns, sources in ZINWA told IRIN that Beitbridge owes Zim $56.1 million (about US $68,990), Gwanda owes Zim $37. 4 million (about US $45,993) and Plumtree's arrears reportedly stand at Zim $29 million (about US $35,663). "There will be a massive disconnection of water supplies [starting at the end of September] to force the authorities and institutions to pay up," said Rosen. However, the directorate of disease control has encouraged dialogue, saying that since ZINWA is an arm of government under the Ministry of Water and Rural Resources, it should not "deliberately start problems that will strain other ministries". "ZINWA is a statutory body and, as such, we expect them to understand the various problems facing the ministry of health in terms of facilities, human resources, equipment and most important of all, drugs. So we assume that they know that disconnecting water supplies is the quickest way to trigger wholesale disease outbreaks," Midzi explained. He added that "disconnecting the towns will create unhygienic conditions, where nothing can be cleaned and ablution facilities cannot work. The first outbreaks to expect would be of hygene-related diseases like general diarrhoea, and then bloody diarrhoea, followed by deadlier diseases like dysentery and cholera, which thrive in dirty environments". "In the light of such fears, I think ZINWA should act responsibly and engage the local authorities in dialogue to find an amicable solution to their standoff on debts. We cannot afford to control any outbreaks because of the economic problems that have filtered down to all government ministries," said Midzi. ECONOMIC CRISIS AFFECTING LOCAL AUTHORITIES Thandeko Zinti Mnkandla, the mayor of Gwanda, the only municipality in Matabeleland South, expressed the same fears of disease breaking out. He said the affected local authorities had tried and failed to meet ZINWA officials to discuss the debt problem in the presence of representatives from the Ministry of Local Government, Public Works and National Housing on two occasions within the past fortnight. "Last week, the meeting failed to take place because of the burial of the late Vice President Simon Muzenda. We have not been given a reason for the failure of the meeting which was supposed to take place on Tuesday, 30 September," Mnkandla said. The affected local authorities had made various proposals for paying off the debt to ZINWA. "I do not have the exact details, but I know that every concerned authority has proposed one way or another to settle the debt. So, ZINWA's plans represent major health hazards, which no local authority can control," the mayor stressed. "For Gwanda we had proposed a steady payment of the debt beginning this month. This decision was taken after considering the precarious state of our finances. Residents owe us millions in unpaid water and other general service rates. Therefore, the situation is that local authorities are caught between service providers demanding payments, and residents who obviously are failing to pay because they are affected in various ways by the economic crisis in the country," Mnkandla explained. He added that "local authorities are trying to engage [residents] in discussions to encourage them to pay". "We cannot afford to disconnect them and risk disease outbreaks. It would be illogical and disastrous in public health terms if ZINWA goes ahead with this plan," Mnkandla warned. By the end of the week there had been no confirmed reports of a town being disconnected. CUTBACKS CONTINUE When the government announced two months ago that it did not have the resources to issue grants to local authorities for essential services, the Bulawayo City Council appealed to the United Nations for help in the procurement of water treatment chemicals. The council also announced that it had stopped testing the city's drinking water for cyanide and mercury, the chemicals widely used by gold panners and mining concerns based along the major rivers that feed the city's five supply dams. ZINWA officials declined to comment on the possible health and environmental effects of the disconnection exercise, should it be carried out. The water authority last month increased water tariffs by between 80 percent and 100 percent, to Zim $180 (about US $0.22) per cubic metre for those who consume up to 10 cubic metres of water per month, while those who consume up to 25 cubic metres now pay Zim $280 (about US $0.34) per cubic metre.