Staff Reporter

President Emmerson Mnangagwa has reiterated that the only lasting solution to end the cholera outbreak was to revamp the local authorities.

Speaking in his weekly column in the Sunday Mail yesterday, President Mnangagwa said that urban councils need to own up and deliver services to residents. He indicated that local authorities must provide modern amenities and infrastructure.

“While water bodies can be provided to potentially meet clean water requirements for our cities, it has become apparent that such a goal remains a pie in the sky until our local authorities are properly and efficiently run,” said President Mnangagwa.

President Mnangagwa stated that urban councils need to be revamped.

“Water supply crises in most of our urban settlements are not explained by the absence of water bodies; rather, they are explained by water conveyance systems which are non-existent, inadequate, inefficient, obsolete, and decrepit. The same also goes for uncollected garbage and broken sewer systems. In the absence of a drastic renovation of all our local authorities in the country, Zimbabwe will continue to suffer periodic outbreaks of preventable diseases, in spite of her many unused water bodies,” he said.

President Mnangagwa articulated that Government was going to improve service delivery in the country through the Ministry of Local Government and Public Works.

“Our towns and cities have been run down precipitously, thanks to gross maladministration by opposition-controlled local authorities. Clean and safe drinking water is either unavailable or erratically supplied.

“Garbage collection services are largely dysfunctional, while broken sewers are a common sight, especially in our high-density suburbs. To compound it all, unplanned and uncontrolled settlements have created a runaway urban sprawl where uncontrolled human settlements have outpaced the provision of basic services that guarantee public health and essential amenities,” said the President.

President Mnangagwa emphasised that Government would not hesitate to call on incompetent urban councils.

“We have already lost enough lives to hefty public health failures that could have been prevented by the provision of efficient services and amenities. Government will not hesitate to intervene where local authorities show lacklustre performance, thus endangering our people,” said President Mnangagwa.

Meanwhile, President Mnangagwa has spelt out the production of water-treatment chemicals at Bindura University, highlighting that it would guarantee the provision of timely, safe water.

“I am very happy that research on water-treatment chemicals at one of our applied research-driven universities has made a breakthrough. Bindura University of Science Education is already producing chemicals for water treatment, thus guaranteeing clean and safe water supply to all urban rural settlements,” he said.

Cholera continues to recur in Zimbabwe, especially in urban areas where there is poor sanitation due to uninspiring service delivery by the Citizens Coalition for Change (CCC)-run urban councils. To date the cholera outbreak has killed more than 100 people and infected 5 000 since February 2023, according to Government data.