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Water contamination a threat to residents of Harare
Combined Harare Residents Association (CHRA)
January 27, 2006

CHRA has repeatedly warned that our drinking water is not fit for human consumption and urgent action must be taken to treat the water to meet World Health Organisation (WHO) and the Standards Association of Zimbabwe (SAZ) minimum standards.

The admission by the illegal Makwavarara Commission that residents have been exposed to life-threatening water reinforces CHRA’s decision to take legal action to compel the Ministry of Health and Child Welfare, the Ministry of Local Government and Urban Development and the illegal Harare Commission to fulfill their statutory obligations to provide residents with a healthy environment.

Media reports have regularly highlighted the dangerous situation. The Town Clerk was quoted in the Herald (11/11/05) advising residents to boil their drinking water, an n unequivocal admission that our water is contaminated.  At least 14 children under the age of five have died of diarrhoeal infections and dysentery and over 200 citizens have been hospitalised after drinking our "clean" water.

Thousands of residents from Mabvuku, Greendale, Mbare and Glen Norah have been reduced to villagers, seeking whatever water they can find whether from broken water pipes or unprotected streams.

The City of Harare must spell out its policy and responsibilities in terms of water treatment, supply and distribution.  The opaque 'deal' between the City and the Zimbabwe National Water Authority (Zinwa) is not acceptable to residents.  ZINWA has even less capacity than the City to treat Harare water. No number of damage control statements by Zinwa on the quality of water will make it cleaner.

The water is dirty and needs to be properly treated.  CHRA does not take Zinwa’s statements seriously as they are misleading and continue to contradict expert information by the city’s Health Department that has categorically condemned the quality of our water quality. According to a council report (Herald 27/1/06) released in December 2005, the Department of Health Services found that Harare’s water was unsafe for drinking because it contained ‘very low concentration of chlorine and high levels of bacteria. It was also found to be acidic and had sedimentary impurities. The report concluded that the water failed to meet WHO and SAZ minimum safety regulations.

The city’s health delivery system has collapsed. The City is criminally negligent and must be held to account, both for the deaths that have already occurred and those that are inevitable unless our water is purified to international standards.  Residents must exercise caution and do whatever they can to protect themselves by boiling or filtering municipal water if they can or using the solar treatment method as a last resort.

The Makwavarara Commission proved itself to be an enemy of residents during their misguided Operation Murambatsvina. The current water crisis shows that they are now prepared to poison us as well. The illegal Commission is a puppet of the regime and therefore we cannot and will not appeal to the agents of that regime to remove it from office. Our only path is to continue with our legal efforts to have it ejected from town house and the restoration of democratic government, both at Town House and Munhumutapa Building.

Do not finance your oppressors! Refuse to pay rates and charges! Boycott the illegal Commission.

Visit the CHRA fact sheet

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