Zimbabwe To Privatise Water Provision for Urban Centres
Zimbabwe government is looking for investors to take over the country’s dysfunctional urban water supply system targeting, most importantly, major cities such as Victoria Falls, Bulawayo and Harare.
The government will privatise the provision of water within a battered system that has, for decades, struggled to provide constant supply of portable water to rate payers. Garwe said:
We were given greenlight to privatise, we are now in the process of inviting the private sector players, both local and international, to bring proposals of interest.
He added:
We want somebody with the capacity to engineer, procure, construct, manage and finance.
“So far, we have received five, three from international players and two from local players.
It’s work in progress and we are hoping by the end of next week, we will have interviewed them and identified the suitable candidates.
Zimbabwe To Privatise Water Provision for Urban Centres
Zimbabwe’s water supply system is still managed by local authorities that have been involved in the blame game with rate payers following the near collapse of once functional service delivery systems.
Harare City Runs Out Of Water Treatment Chemicals
Rate payers accuse city fathers of continued failure to deliver smooth service while the councils blame residents for abandoning their civic duties to pay rates whenever they are required.
The government likewise, has also been blamed for inconsistent policies that have seen the value of the money collected in terms of revenue whittled down by inflation.
Suppliers of essential material needed to keep the taps running have demanded hard cash for their products while councils collect a large portion of their revenue in local currency.
The outcome has been a battered water supply system that has seen some suburbs in major cities go for years without running water.
We want by the end of this month, to make sure that we have dealt with issues of water in Harare.
“We are not looking at a segmented approach, like what used to happen before but we are looking at an investor who comes and cover the whole value chain, from purification, distribution, billing and watering.”
