Bulawayo’s water blues

Residents in Bulawayo, Zimbabwe’s second largest city, will now go for four days without water every week after the local authority reviewed the water shedding pogramme.

In a notice this morning Bulawayo city council said the new water shedding programme will take effect on Monday. 

The development comes at a time when one of the city’s supply dam’s, Umzingwane has neared decommissioning with water levels at 4.85 percent.

According to the local authority the city’s water demand stands 155 mega litres a day against available capacity of 110 mega litres a day.

Part of the notice reads, “the programme is being reviewed in a bid to stabilize the reservoirs and prevent them from depleting further.”

The local authority said the revised water shedding programme is meant to raise the raw water reservoir level to “a comfortable buffer level of 5.5m”.

“The current level of 0.76m (14% full) is not safe for the city’s high-water demand being experienced,” said council.

Bulawayo city council highlighted a number of challenges it is facing in connection with the water supply situation which include intermittent power supply to water treatment plants.

The local authority expects water the shedding programme to improve if the raw water reservoir level improves or deteriorates beyond the critical level.