Did Plumtree Town Council fail to provide water to residents due to financial challenges?

Claim:  Plumtree Council Chairperson, councillor Fanisani Dube says the border town experienced three days without water supplies due to a lack of resources to fix several burst pipes.
Source: He said this in a side interview with CITE while attending the Provincial Councillors meeting held by Zimbabwe Human Rights (ZIMRIGHTS) on the 30th of October 2019.

He said the local authority was failing to fix burst pipes owing to economic hardships.

Background: Cllr Dube said the local authority could no longer afford to deliver proper service delivery owing to economic challenges.
“As Plumtree, we are not spared from the economic hardships happening in the country, we struggle with revenue collection,” he said.
“People are not paying efficiently to the council and this makes it hard for the authority to afford proper service delivery to residents, we are struggling when it comes to revenue collection
Cllr Dube said due to failure to secure revenue from residents, the authority can no longer afford to have spare parts in cases of emergency water bursts pipes.
“Because of failure to efficiently collect revenue, we end up having problems in acquiring spare parts in areas to do with water, this then affects us when we experience faults,” he said.
“As I speak, we have not had water for the past three days in Plumtree because we have had various pipe bursts tat happened and the local authority is struggling to get those pipes so that we can fix the faults to avail water to residents,” he said.

Verdict: Ongoing CITE conducted some investigations and also contacted Plumtree Residents Association through their chairperson Jethias Ncube who confirmed that several areas in Plumtree spent a week without water, with Mangwe being the worst affected going for over a week.
“We experienced water woes over the past week due to electrical faults, residents spent a week without water as there were about six burst pipes and there was no material to fix those pipes,” said Ncube.
“Mangwe was the worst affected as it went for over a week without water.”