The Sunday Mail
Debra Matabvu—
The Harare City Council will start installing its much-debated prepaid water meters on May 16, 2016 with the initial phase targeting 2 000 households and business units. Citywide rollout will come in November this year. The meters, The Sunday Mail has gathered, have already been delivered to council and will be commissioned in Milton Park, the Avenues, industrial areas and the central business district.
Chitungwiza, Ruwa and Norton municipalities will also pre-pay for bulk water from Harare.
Town House believes pre-paid metering will help conserve water, eliminate billing problems and optimise revenue collection.
However, resident representative bodies say the measures violate the constitutional right to access to water.
Human rights activists say access to “water is an inalienable right and demanding payment upfront will hit the poor hard”.
Section 77 of Zimbabwe’s Constitution says every person has the “right to safe, clean and potable water, and (b) sufficient food and the State must take reasonable legislative and other measures within the limits of the resources available to it to achieve the progressive realisation of this right”.
Harare Water director, Engineer Christopher Zvobgo said, “We have identified five contractors for the pilot project which begins on May 16. They are expected to supply 2 000 pre-paid water meters in the selected suburbs.
“We will install at least 300 meters per area, with the pilot project running for six months after which it will be rolled out to other parts of the city.
“We are also contemplating installing bulk water meters in dormitory towns as this will help us recover debts from those municipalities and increase revenue.
“Chitungwiza Town Council owes us US$6 million (for water already supplied). We engaged them three weeks ago and they came up with a payment plan in terms of which they will pay US$15 000 per week. Still, this is not enough. As at July 2015, Ruwa and Norton owed us US$3 million apiece.”
Combined Harare Residents’ Association director Mr Simbarashe Moyo said they would take the council to court over the meters.
“We believe this is not the best time to install such meters. The city is lagging behind in terms of technological advancements thus we feel the system will not be managed effectively.
“The meters could be prone to faults: What happens when they are down? Customers could go for days without water! We will take the legal route and organise marches to stop them.
Council should first attend to other issues like replacing old water pipes and the sewer network.”
University of Zimbabwe rural and urban planning lecturer Mr Nyasha Mutsindikwa backed Town House.
“People must pay for the services rendered to them. (In any case) the pilot project will help Council identify strengths and weaknesses of such as system,” he said.
Harare joins Johannesburg, Kampala, Nairobi, Maputo, Lusaka and other African cities with prepaid water.
South Africa, which has a free basic water access policy, adopted the system in 2009, with Johannesburg municipality saving R800 million in 2013/14.
Nairobi, Kenya installed 620 prepaid meters on individual water connections on middle and low-income housing estates and in apartment blocks in 2008.
The initiative was extended to informal settlements to improve payment and reduce the cost of water to those without their own connections.
A 2014 World Bank study, “Limits and Possibilities of Prepaid Water in Urban Africa: Lessons from the Field,” shows that most residents of selected cities in Uganda, Zambia, Mozambique, Lesotho, South Africa, Kenya and Namibia prefer a prepaid system as they can control consumption, thereby making savings.
The study considers arguments against the system, but concludes that the technology is not anti-poor.
Lead researcher Chris Heymans says, “Our findings suggest that customers care less about the technology of water services and far more about convenience, price and reliability.
“We found that while prepaid water is not a miracle cure, many utilities and the customers they serve believe that with proper planning and management, prepaid systems can bring marked benefits such as greater control over spending on water, not incurring debt, and less constrained hours of access.
“Prepaid water systems are not a technical magical wand to fix underlying management issues in the delivery of urban water supply. A service provider that falls short on effective management, governance, and sound customer relations is likely to take on far more than it can deal with by resorting to prepaid systems.”
Finance and Economic Development Minister Patrick Chinamasa advocated the system in his 2016 National Budget Statement.
He said: “This prepaid system will align service delivery to revenue collections, that way avoiding incidences of debt accumulation. I am proposing the initial phase embrace compulsory prepaid meters for industry, commerce and low-density residential areas.”
