Zimbabwe's parched Bulawayo rations to save dwindling water

Families in the southern Zimbabwean city of Bulawayo are going up to four days without running water as drought dries the dams the city depends on, city council officials said.

The city has since late November imposed 96-hour dry periods for residential water customers, though industrial and business users have continued to receive service, according to the Bulawayo City Council.

An extended drought has reduced supplies of stored water, forcing the city to decommission two of its major supply dams, said Nesisa Mpofu, a spokeswoman for the council.

Shortages of hydropower-produced electricity also have affected the city's ability to pump water from the dams, she said.

"Out of six dams, Bulawayo now remains with four water sources," she said.

A herd boy washes off dirt while perching on rocks cropping up on the riverbed of the drying Mabwematema dam.

The four-day water outages - up from three days previously - have spurred widespread local efforts to store more water and to find alternative sources.

Arnold Batirai, a councillor for Nketa, a suburb of Bulawayo, said many residents in his area had access to alternative water sources such as wells or water supply trucks provided by the council.

But he acknowledged that not all borehole wells were still functioning, while shortages of fuel had affected water truck deliveries in some areas.

"Despite these challenges, we do encourage residents to conserve water and report burst pipes or water leakages,” he said.

Many residents now keep buckets or other containers of water in their homes, sometimes filled at their place of work.

"I carry a 25-litre container to work, where I fetch water from the bathroom, mindful of colleagues who may report me to my superiors,” said Siphathisiwe Ndimande, a mother of three who lives in Nketa.

An aerial view of herd boys pulling out an ox stuck in muddy waters in the drying Mabwematema dam.

Affluent residents in some suburbs have dug new deep wells in response to dry taps and installed large tanks that store thousands of litres of water.

Other parched residents, such as 71-year-old Mildred Mkandla, have installed water harvesting systems on their homes, to catch what rain falls.

"Residents don’t harvest rainwater but watch it flow away," she told the Thomson Reuters Foundation.

'WATER FOR ALL'

Zimbabwe has seen rain in recent weeks - including violent storms that destroyed roofs and washed away bridges - but water reserves overall remain low.

Ndlovu said families had been advised to try to harvest rainwater and to plant early maturing crops, which require a shorter period of rainfall to grow.

"My ministry is looking at how best to assist communities," he said.

But some Bulawayo residents said the national government had done too little to help the city.

"Government has done nothing to solve Bulawayo's water crisis," complained Sinothando Mathe, who lives in Pumula North, a poor western suburb.

Cows stuck in muddy waters in the drying Mabwematema dam.

Faced with struggling residents, Raji Modi, a Bulawayo South legislator and the country's deputy minister of industry, in November initiated his own "free water for all programme".

Water trucks he has hired now deliver water to neighbourhoods without it, drawn from his own borehole wells.

"I have a sustainable water plant and decided to assist residents who go for days without due to water cuts," he said, noting the cost of the effort was mainly fuel for the trucks.

Modi suggested pumping and storing more groundwater could be one way to help Bulawayo deal with its worsening water shortages.

Reuters