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The Victoria Falls

Leonard Ncube in Victoria Falls
VICTORIA Falls Municipality’s $13 million water and sewer system upgrade could take longer to implement than expected after Government ordered the local authority to re-apply for borrowing powers.

The local authority partnered the Infrastructure Development Bank of Zimbabwe (IDBZ), which seeks to invest $13 million in the project. This comes at a time when residents have complained about continued erratic water services where some sections of Mkhosana suburb endure water cuts on a daily basis, a situation attributed to continuous faults at the pump points as well as lack of capacity by the Zimbabwe National Water Authority (Zinwa).

Town Clerk, Mr Ronnie Dube, said council had been told that its borrowing certificate had expired.

“The Ministry of Finance advised us to re-apply for borrowing powers because our borrowing certificate is now invalid. I think it’s because there has been a lot of economic changes that have taken place in the new dispensation,” said Mr Dube.

He said the council had applied for borrowing powers in 2014. Borrowing powers enable a local authority to be eligible to access certain amounts of money for capital projects within its jurisdiction.

The municipality has to apply to Government seeking borrowing powers for the $13 million in terms of the Urban Councils’ Act, Chapter 29:15 Section 290 (3).

The Water, Sanitation and Hygiene (WASH) project was initially earmarked to start early this year and to be rolled out in two phases. It was supposed to run concurrently with BB7 and Buffer Zone housing projects whose servicing is already complete. The project will incorporate water and sewer system in BD39 (Aerodrome), which is not part of the current municipality network.

Last year council said it had spent $85 384 on layout plans for the project, with $6,6 million of the budget set aside for the first phase, while the second phase would cost $5,2 million, according to the feasibility study.

Council is owed close to $16 million by residents and businesses while it owes service providers over $8 million. It has also applied to Government to be given rights to manage raw water, currently a preserve for Zinwa. Government recently sent a delegation to assess the local authority’s capacity and results are yet to be released.

@ncubeleon