The ManicaPost
Abel Zhakata Senior Reporter
MUTARE City Council is on the market to borrow $700 000, which is required to complete a duplicate water pipeline that is expected to end two decades of water woes in Dangamvura and Fern Valley suburbs.
The pipeline, which connects the Dangamvura Reservoir to the giant Christmas Pass tanks, was abandoned seven years ago after the local authority was duped of $330 000 by a local supplier.
Although a Mutare court ruled in 2012 that Anderson Mwashita’s company — Shitazburg Investments — restitutes the local authority, nothing has been recovered, resulting in the water pipeline project lying idle without funding.
Town Clerk, Mr Joshua Maligwa, said although the local authority was borrowing fresh capital to fund the project, the municipality had not given up on its bid to recover the $330 000 from Shitazburg Investments.
“We have now engaged the police to hunt for the man who disappeared with our money. At the moment we are in the process of recovering $30 000, which Mwashita deposited to a certain company in South Africa. “Our lawyers are working on that and we hope the money will come our way soon. The whereabouts of Mwashita are not yet known, but we are keeping our fingers crossed and pray that the police will soon catch up with him.”
Mr Maligwa said council had engaged several financial institutions willing to bankroll the outstanding 4km stretch of the pipeline to the tune of $700 000.
“We have lined up the Infrastructure Development Bank of Zimbabwe which has already carried out a study of the project.
“We have also lined up CBZ, MetBank, CABS and the Southern Region Trading Company. These institutions will come on board on the private-public-partnership platform,” he said. If all goes according to plan, said Mr Maligwa, council expects to complete the project before year end.
“This trunk line must be completed because it will not only ease prevailing water shortages, but also aid urban expansion,” he said.
“We have since advertised for serious contractors to come on-board so that we finish the pipeline at a cost of $700 000.
“Despite serious cash flow problems we are facing, we have decided to go out of our way to borrow money to complete the pipeline because the people of Dangamvura have been suffering for a long time.
“We value our residents in Dangamvura who have gone for more than 10 years without adequate water supplies. There will be abundant water supply in Dangamvura and this will also alleviate water challenges in Fern Valley.
“That trunk line will also benefit emerging locations between Dangamvura and Fern Valley as well as providing water to the Midlands State University campus and Zimunya Township. We will soon parcel out 350 low-density stands in Fern Valley that will also get water once that trunk line is complete.”
Council recently allocated 15 hectares of land to the Zimbabwe School of Mines for the construction of a college that will also get water once the trunk line is finished.
Mr Maligwa said the local authority would efficiently meter all the households in Dangamvura in order to realise meaningful returns from the project and be able to pay back the $700 000.
