The Parliamentary Thematic Committee on Gender and Development will quiz two ministers whose line ministries are responsible for water over their failure to provide the precious liquid to the nation.
Local Government minister Ignatius Chombo and Water Resources minister Samuel Sipepa Nkomo are set to be grilled by the committee comprising Senators.
According to the Parliament schedule of committee meetings this week, the Thematic Committee on Gender and Development is currently putting down questions they would pose to the two ministers.
“Questions will be posed to the Minister of Local Government on the provision of clean water to urban communities. The Minister of Water Resources Development and Management will be quizzed on the development of water resources in the country,” read the Parliament schedule. The two ministers will appear before the thematic committee at a time Harare has been hard hit by typhoid.
This week cases of suspected typhoid increased to 500 in Harare and the city council suspects the major cause to be unclean water.
Council spokesperson Leslie Gwindi told NewsDay the cases might not exactly be typhoid, but watery diarrhoea due to unsanitary conditions or unclean water.
Provision of clean water has been a major challenge for Harare and mayor Muchadeyi Masunda recently said capacity at Morton Jaffray Waterworks, that serves Greater Harare, Norton, Ruwa, Epworth and Chitungwiza, was 604 megalitres per day which was not enough to serve a hub of four million people.
He said the second main water treatment plant, Prince Edward, had a capacity of 90 megalitres per day and the two waterworks gave a total installed capacity of 704 megalitres per day against demand of 1 200 megalitres per day in winter and 1 400 megalitres per day in summer.
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Masunda said since the commissioning of Morton Jaffray in 1953, the plant had not been expanded to correspond with the increasing population.
