Residents and officials in Zimbabwe’s second-largest city, Bulawayo, are calling for solar power installations at water pumping stations as widespread power cuts leave thousands without water for weeks.
The crisis in Bulawayo has intensified as national electricity shortages prevent the city from pumping water from its dwindling reservoirs to residential areas.
“These problems have been attributed to compromised pumping capacity due to ongoing power outages affecting our pump stations. One major pipeline even experienced a burst, all these issues came together to compromise our situation,” Ward 2 Councillor Adrian Rendani Moyo said in an interview with CITE.
While the city is in discussions with the state power utility ZESA, officials say nationwide power challenges make it impossible to exempt Bulawayo’s waterworks from load shedding.
“So it would be better for the city to expand and amplify conversations around solar energy or alternative sources of power as a way of bridging the gap so that rate payers are not affected by power outages leading to lack of water delivered to households,” Moyo said.
“The scarcity of water is a serious health hazard with frightening consequences. As ratepayers, we must hold the Bulawayo City Council (BCC) and the government accountable to provide adequate water without fail,” says Emmanuel Sibanda, a resident.
Residents have criticised city authorities for failing to implement backup power solutions despite years of electricity problems.
“We appreciate their current excuses but some of these issues like standby power generation were raised to them in our previous budget meetings but they just ignored. The little water would be pumped timeously if generators were there as backup power,” says Dennis Dubley, a local resident.
“No intelligent engineer would commission such important pumps without standby power available. Never depend on another organisation for your essential services entirely. I fully understand the situation on dam levels and still question the inaction taken to gold panners at the catchment dam area,” he added.
The power outages affect key facilities such as the Ncema Waterworks, Nyamandlovu Aquifer and Criterion Waterworks, which feed into six critical reservoirs across the city.
“In my ward, the whole week went by without any water availed to the city and at the moment even our bowser system is not able to assist because all our browsers are down. I think there is one bowser which is assisting funeral gatherings,” Cllr Moyo said.
The councillor blamed the city’s centralised procurement system for delays in acquiring more water delivery trucks: “That is also something linked to our centralised procurement process which actually makes it difficult for the city to procure goods that are required urgently.”
While solar power could offer a solution, the councillor acknowledges it requires significant investment: “It might be expensive to go solar but we need to look at the options on the table. We would love to rely on our traditional source of power but the problem as it stands is that traditional source of power has proven to be ineffective because it’s not consistent.”
The crisis affects all six major reservoirs – Criterion, Magwegwe, Rifle Range, 6J, Tuli, and Hillside – impacting water supply to both residential and industrial areas. Many residents now rely on alternative sources like boreholes or private water deliveries.
