THE Bulawayo City Council has discovered that 280 boreholes out of the 286 it tested have “consumable water” but urged residents to boil before drinking it, in case the water might contain some impurities. Report by Blondie Ndebele Own correspondent
According to council minutes released last week, testing of water quality by the local authority’s laboratory was ongoing.
“The city laboratory recently advised that borehole water quality was subject to change without notice due to the nature of feeders into the underground storage,” the report read.
“Residents should test borehole water by making tea and adding milk. If the water was non-consumable, the tea would turn thick.”
Residents had raised health concerns after some of the boreholes produced dirty brown-like water.
The city has 355 mapped boreholes with 281 already functional.
The local authority has since last year, maintained a stringent water usage level regime after most of its supply dams ran out of water.
Residents are currently receiving potable water for only 96 hours each week as the water-shedding regime remains in force amid reports that the recent heavy downpours had only contributed a paltry 0,35% inflow into the city’s supply dams.
