Online Reporter
Ray Bande
Senior Reporter
PRIVATISATION of the provision of water in Mutare city, which is expected to usher in efficiency in providing the precious liquid, while maintaining affordability to the general public, is at an advanced stage after the completion of public consultations, and the local authority is now seized with formation and registration of a company that will deliver the service.
The move comes at a time when Government is privatising key service delivery functions in major cities to improve efficiency and modernise urban management systems.
The Manica Post has established that the company is expected to operate at full throttle in a year’s time.
Mutare Town Clerk, Mr Blessing Chafesuka told this newspaper that they completed consultations with members of the public who agreed to have the project in place.
Mr Chafesuka said the whole idea is, not to place the price of water beyond the reach of low income earners, but to make the provision of water in suburbs and workplaces more efficient.
“We completed the consultations with members of the public on the privatisation of water supply, and they agreed that this was for the good of the city.
“We are now seized with formation and registration of a company that will take over that responsibility. This stage will also cover modalities on how the company will operate. We do not expect this to bring in
exorbitant costs to the water service. We look forward to it bringing in efficiency in the management of water. As the economy improves, it should also reflect.
“But if there are costs that are coming in, just like what we do as a local authority, we always go back to the ratepayers and plead our case on why we want an increase,” he said.
He said there will be monitoring, checks and balances on the operations of the company that will be providing water to the city.
“Under this arrangement, this company will be the operator, and the local authority will be the regulator. What that means is that there are key decisions that the company cannot make all alone. They have to submit their proposals to the local authority on tariffs with justifications. So there are some controls when it comes to tariffing,” said Mr Chafesuka.
He said investment in water service has been very lowresulting in poor service delivery.
“Investment in water infrastructure is currently low,and for us to attract investors in this sector, they prefer to work withprivate investors for several reasons.
“First, it is about decision making. In most cases,our services suffer because of our bureaucratic system of governance. At times,some decisions take a very long time to be made because several offices have to
be consulted and papers signed.
“For example, when an engineer leaves and we want toreplace him or her, sometimes it takes one year or even two years to completethe processes that are required to replace that engineer, and services will besuffering big time.
“We have one engineer whom we managed to replace afterthree years. The process involves council resolving and taking the matter toLocal Government. “They take their time also to make decisions and give
clearance. This also involves advertising the standards that have to becomplied with. Meanwhile, as all this happens, service delivery will be suffering.
“The other aspect is that in an environment where policies and market forces are ever changing, you need to be able to make
decisions quickly in water provision,” said Mr Chafesuka.
He added that Public Procurement systems have also militated against efficient water service delivery.
“A very clear example relates to public procurement policies. If you want to buy water chemicals, you subject yourself to a process that makes the whole thing more expensive to buy some products.
“A private company can bypass some of the processesthat we have to go through. They can buy direct from manufacturers outside the country within a short space of time. For us it is not easy.
“Multilateral financial institutions worldwide are investing in water utility companies especially those that are not controlled
by Local Government and operating as commercial entities. So we as look forward
to tap into this space, it should improve the water service,” he said.
Mr Chafesuka said the privatisation of the provisionof water is a normal and fashionable trend globally and regionally.
In any case, from our study, Zimbabwe could be theonly country that is still running the provision of water under a local
authority. If you go to South Africa, their water supply service is run by a private company owned by a local authority. We were in Zambia early this year, and they are doing the same thing, while getting a lot of support,” said Mr Chafesuka.
