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Midlands Bureau Chief
The Zimbabwe National Water Authority (Zinwa) is struggling to recover over $1 million it is allegedly owed by Kwekwe City Council in raw water bills since the local authority has the burden of supplying Redcliff with treated water.Kwekwe supplies treated water to Redcliff and the town’s municipality allegedly owes Kwekwe nearly $13 million in treated water bills.

In an interview, Zinwa regional manager for Sanyati Catchment area, Mr Chengetai Gozo, said Kwekwe was failing to service its debt despite numerous efforts to engage it.

“The problem is they fail to implement their payment plan. I understand they have started defaulting again but we will keep engaging them. We appreciate the challenges that are bedevilling our economy,” he said.

Former Kwekwe mayor, Mr Shadreck Tobaiwa, told Chronicle recently that an agreement was entered into between Zinwa and the Ministers of Local Government, Rural and Urban Development, Dr Ignatius Chombo and his Water Resources and Development counterpart, Mr Samuel Sipepa Nkomo, not to disconnect Kwekwe regardless of the circumstances.

“Our challenge is we service our account but we have to sustain another whole town which does not pay us  anything. We buy water treatment chemicals and pump treated water to two cities yet only one of them is paying for the chemicals. Redcliff is not paying us anything and they owe us over $12million.

“We engaged the two ministers, Dr Chombo and Mr Nkomo and they told Zinwa not to disconnect us because they understand our challenge. We make payment plans but we find it difficult to honour them at times,” he said.

Kwekwe Town clerk, Mr Ngwena Musara, however, dismissed claims that they were not servicing their water account with Zinwa.
He said the city was the biggest consumer of water in Zimbabwe after Harare, hence it was only natural for it to have a huge bill.

“We have big industries in the city like Zimasco, Delta and Ziscosteel which guzzle a lot of water. We are big consumers of water and we sustain Redcliff town. Government understandably told Zinwa not to disconnect us and we are also not allowed to disconnect Redcliff despite their huge bill, it’s not possible. For as long as we are breathing, we should give life to Redcliff,” he said.

Mr Musara said Kwekwe  services its major accounts like Zesa, water treatment chemicals providers, Zinwa and the Government through Zimra.
He said Zinwa should appreciate the liquidity crunch facing the economy.

“We only owe Zinwa $1 million and Redcliff Municipality owes us over $12 million. We have overhead expenses like buying water treatment chemicals, treating the water and pumping water to residents and industry. We also have to pay labour as well. What overheads does Zinwa have? Our industry  has not been performing well and some companies have since  closed.

“The economy is not in its best shape and everyone should appreciate this simple fact,” said Mr Musara.
The city’s Director of Finance, Ms Rejoice Maweni, said a cheque is processed for Zinwa every week.

“We are actually sticking to the payment plan. We are paying them something every week,” said Ms Maweni.