Bubi Rural District Council (BRDC) has introduced a special levy to be paid by all villagers towards the purchasing of a rig to drill boreholes as part of the efforts to improve service delivery in the area.
This was revealed by BRDC Chief Executive Officer, Dr Patson Mlilo during the commissioning of the Inyathi High Density Location Emergency Water Supply project by the Church of Jesus Christ Latter Day Saints.
“As council, one of our major roles is to deliver service delivery, we have five duties, the first one is to ensure that people have water, Bubi has a challenge when it comes to water, we only have three major dams, Mbembesi, Ngwigwizi and Bubi which is still small hence water for drinking is a challenge for both humans and wildlife, at times even the underground water is a challenge, you drill and hit a dry hole, so it means we must resort to piped water scheme to areas without water,” he said.
“This year, the council introduced a special levy where all villagers are expected to pay US$20 towards the purchasing of a rig, we urge all the leadership to encourage people to pay this US$20 so that we can purchase it.”
He said with a rig, the local authority will ensure that in every village there is a borehole, “We will however later on substitute with a solar piped scheme.”
Meanwhile, Dr Mlilo appealed for assistance in building infrastructure at learning institutions in the district.
“As council, we also look at education, it is the role of council to ensure that in all areas there are schools with adequate infrastructure which includes classroom blocks, teachers’ cottages and everything that is needed. In this area we still have a challenge, especially in new resettlement areas, we still have learners who are using houses which were used by horses and mud huts thatched with grasses, so we still appeal for help in that area,” he said.
He urged the local leadership to encourage parents to pay school levies so that they can construct schools.
“You go to a school and notice that just a third of the learners have paid, if we are not paying, we won’t be able to build.”
In health services, the CEO appealed for a mobile clinic.
“We also focus on health services, we are constructing clinics, we recently built Bona clinic using the devolution funds, and at the moment we are building in Mbembeswana in wards 18 and 17. We wish to have clinics in all areas because, by government law, people should not travel more than 5km in search of primary health care service, so we are also appealing for assistance in the construction of clinics.”
“We used to have a mobile clinic which used to help in areas which are far from the health centres, we have since decommissioned it as it was now old, so we are appealing for a mobile clinic,” said Dr Mlilo.
In addition, he said that in road infrastructure, their greatest challenge is the lack of equipment.
“Our roads are now in bad condition, the council has its program of purchasing plants and equipment so that our roads are rehabilitated. The government has its program under ZINARA of road fund, every year we receive money to improve our roads.”
“There was another program of emergency road rehabilitation program which helped us to do bush clearance in all our roads but we were limited and could not grade it, so the greatest challenge is equipment, if we have equipment we will have beautiful roads,” said Dr Mlilo.
