By CHRA| Harare City Council blamed government’s insufficient distribution of devolution funds for causing poor service delivery (water supply and waste management) in the City.
In the State of the City Address held in Harare, yesterday, Harare City Council Mayor, Jacob Mafume said the devolution funds that government released are not sufficient enough to support adequate service delivery projects.
“Devolution funds are being released but these are not adequate. For example, in the 2022 budget we were allocated over ZWL$2, 3 billion but to date we have received ZWL$ 73 million by end of June and a further ZWL$91 million in July.
“We are past the half year, and this means the capital projects we had planned will not be completed,” said the Harare Mayor.
There is inadequate supply in the City, with some parts of Harare (Eastern, Western, Northern, North-Western, Southern and South-Western surburbs) experiencing water rationing.
According to the Harare Mayor, City Council encounters challenges in the provision and supply coverage of water, owing to the deteriorating water services infrastructure.
“Harare and its dormitory Towns’ water demand is around 800ML/Day. Due operational and infrastructural challenges, we are not able to meet this demand. Our Water Production Capacity at Morton Jeffery is 470 ML/Day but over the past months, our production has been depressed, averaging 295 ML/Day,” added the Mayor.
However, City Council said it will continue to take up measures to, “increase Water Production and reach its target of producing 470 ML/Day by 31st of December 2022 and progressively increase each year until we reach the 800 ML/Day production by the year 2025”.
Also, the mayor stated that due to shortage of refuse collection machinery, collection, disposal and management of the refuse in the City has become almost impossible for the local Council.
“Your City for the past 6 months managed to maintain an average daily fleet of 10 Compactors out of a desired 46 Compactors to collect waste in the 46 Wards.
“We are currently collecting waste from 207 000 properties. Our collection efficiency has been compromised due to non-availability of adequate fleet and this has seen the recurrence of illegal dumps across the City.
“Recently we purchased 3 Compactors using our own funds and we are hoping to purchase more before the end of the year if Government honors its obligation to release devolution funds which we had budgeted for the purchase of refuse collection compactors and trucks,” he said.
Meanwhile, City Council said it recognizes the significance of the Informal sector and urged all illegal business operators to get licensed.
“The Informal Sector businesses continues to grow and as of June 2022 an estimated 100 000 informal businesses are operating in Harare.
“As a City we have since rebranded these business as Small to Medium Enterprises and we are in the process of providing them with decent trading spaces as well as encouraging them to regularise their operations by obtaining appropriate trading licences and paying of taxes to government, said Mayor Mafume.
“To support the growth of the informal sector, as a City we are constructing two (2) informal sector facilities that is Seke Dieppe (Coca-Cola) people Market and Hatcliffe Market,” he added.