The Sunday Mail
Debra Matabvu
Harare residents have finally embraced the prepaid water metering system with indications the city council’s target to pilot 1 750 meters in five selected suburbs has been fully subscribed.
Last month, city authorities called on residents in Bluff Hill, Greendale, the Avenues, Kambuzuma, Sunningdale and some industrial areas to sign up for the pilot project.
This followed a protracted disagreement between the Harare City Council and the Combined Harare Residents Association with the latter rejecting prepaid water as unconstitutional.
The local authority will now start the water prepaid water meters pilot project next week.
Harare Water distribution manager Mr Hosiah Chisango said if the pilot worked out well, prepaid water meters would be installed across the city.
“Residents in Bluffhill and Greendale have not objected to the installation of prepaid water meters under the pilot project, but we will not install in Greendale because of water shortages (there),” he said.
“The installation of the prepaid meters should be done in a cluster, thus if the number of those opposing the idea is less than those willing we proceed installing the meters at all houses in the selected areas.”
The meters will be connected to a local data concentrator that uses radio signals to communicate with a server at the main water station and the billing system.
The system will work the same way as electricity prepaid meters, and customers will purchase water vouchers at vendor booths that are yet to be set up.
Information obtained shows the meters use a batteries that last between three and seven years without being charged or changed.
The meters will also have a facility that adjusts water pressure to suit consumers’ different needs (domestic and industrial), with cost increasing with the rise in pressure.
The prepaid meters will be installed with free three cubic meters of water (3 000 litres).
The pilot project in Harare will begin on May 16 after five contractors were awarded a tender to supply the meters.
In his 2016 National Budget, Finance Minister Patrick Chinamasa said prepaid water meters were necessary to avoid incidences of debt accumulation by local authorities.
“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,” Minister Chinamasa said.
However, introduction of pre-paid water has triggered an uproar among some consumers who argue that it is unconstitutional because the supreme law guarantees the right to water.
They contend that the poor will not access water.
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 measure, within the limits of the resources available to it, to achieve the progressive realisation of this right”.
Bulawayo’s council bowed to demands by residents and abolished the system to make customers pay before accessing water.
A World Bank study indicates most African cities have embraced the pre-paid water meters with success registered in these cities.
The meters have been installed in Kampala, Nairobi, Maputo, and Lusaka among other cities.
Johannesburg municipality says it saved water worth R800 million in 2013-14 thanks to the prepaid system.
In South Africa, residents are given 6 000 litres of free water per household monthly according to the Free Basic Water Access policy enshrined in that country’s constitution.
