The Bulawayo City Council (BCC) has dispatched a team to assess its water quality after Luveve residents laid a complaint that several residents had fallen sick after consuming water straight from the taps.
The city is currently under a 144-hour water-shedding programme as the city`s remaining three supply dams are about 29 percent full.
BCC Senior Public Relations Officer Nesisa Mpofu confirmed in an interview with CITE that they had sent out a team to attend to the issue.
“The City of Bulawayo has received the complaint from the residents and has sent teams to investigate the source of the complaints,” said Mpofu.
“The City of Bulawayo would like to advise members of the public to use safe and clean containers to store potable water during periods of water-shedding. Consumers are advised to keep potable water in safe containers preferably with small spouts that minimize contamination,” she said.
She added that drinking water should be kept safe and marked with the date it was stored.
“After containers have been filled with clean water, mark them with the words “Drinking Water” and indicate the date of storage. Direct heat and light can slowly damage plastic containers resulting in eventual leakage, so they should be stored in a dark, cool, and dry place. Container caps should be tightly secured,” said Mpofu
Residents who spoke to this publication said they had fallen sick after drinking the water.
“Some people started getting sick on Sunday so we are assuming that water which came on Saturday made people sick, we drank the water directly from the taps without boiling it because we have never had any problems with BCC water but as of late we cannot say the same,” said Faith Ncube from Old Luveve.
Emma Mhlanga from New Luveve also complained of the water quality after it produced a muddy odour.
“The water comes out from the tap looking clean but once you fill it in buckets and it settles down you see that it is dirty because it has some brownish particles at the bottom,” said Mhlanga.
“I think that is what is making us sick because as of Tuesday the whole house has been sick and we do not know what to do because we are scared of going to clinics.”
The residents added that they have resorted to boiling the water before drinking it.
BCC must priories the treatment of water and help those affected, attend urgently to concerns raised by residents, l can’t believe 40 years after independence we still do not have clean water with covid 19 pandemic so rampant WHO must be contacted and alerted in writing a response from them must be published on this site. BCC please respond?.
Luba kanjan my point is sending a team to investing the concern is not enough, those affected must be helped and above all WHO must be alerted especially in view of the covid 19 pandemic.