Report raises red flag on borehole water
MOST of the borehole water in Masvingo City has been certified unsafe for drinking and residents have been warned against consuming it because it does not meet World Health Organisation (WHO) standards.
Town clerk Mr Adolf Gusha said the findings were in a Service Level Benchmarking (SLB) peer review report released recently.
He said the report showed that most of the water from boreholes in the city did not meet WHO guidelines for drinking purposes.
He said the water was recommended for gardening and watering of lawns.
The team, led by Bulawayo town clerk, Mr Christopher Dube, however, gathered that the city’s treated water had no problem in bacteriological and chemical analysis despite pollution challenges from upstream of the main supply dam, Lake Mutirikwi.
Mr Gusha said the monitoring of the city’s drinking water was done by the health department to assess the bacteriological and chemical quality through accredited laboratories.
“We have community boreholes in the city whose water has been certified to be unclean. The water is used as an alternative to conventional water when there is breakdown,” said Mr Gusha.
He said samples were collected from boreholes in Rujeko Clinic, Mucheke Clinic, Runyararo Clinic, Victoria High School, Bushmead, Building Brigade and 4.1 Combat Group Battalion.
“The samples of water collected proved that the borehole water does not meet WHO guidelines and this means residents should not use the precious liquid, for drinking purposes,” he said.
He said Masvingo city’s biggest challenge was that pumping capacity was not meeting demand for water every day as residents needed at least 50 megalitres a day, but the main water plant at Bushmead had the capacity to pump only 30 megalitres a day.
As a stop gap measure, council has introduced water rationing in most residential areas, for 16 hours a day.
He however, said the city was working on modalities to increase the pumping capacity to higher levels with talks having already started with some strategic partners from China.
He said they were also having challenges with water bursts due to old pipes.
There were reports that some pipes were more than 50 years old and were installed in the pre-colonial era.
The city, he said, was also grappling with cases of vandalism of water infrastructure at the Bushmead Water plant.