Harare residents have confronted MDC-T leader Morgan Tsvangirai accusing the main opposition party of abandoning people by embracing the highly pre-paid water meters.
BY Edgar Gweshe
The Combined Harare Residents’ Association (CHRA) wrote a letter to Tsvangirai on Monday querying why the party, which controls Harare City Council, had vacillated on its position to reject pre-paid water metres.
The development comes after MDC-T secretary for local government Eddie Cross wrote a letter to CHRA in which he highlighted his support for pre-payment of water. This was contrary to the previous sentiments from the party’s secretary-general Douglas Mwonzora that the party was against pre-paid water meters.
Mwonzora told a public meeting organised by CHRA in Harare last month that the MDC-T was against pre-paid water meters as they were anti-poor.
However, on April 25, Cross wrote to CHRA arguing that pre-paid water meters were the way to go as “nearly half of the revenue of all local authorities is derived from water sales”.
Cross, as part of his arguments, said that pre-paid water meters would give local authorities the opportunity to collect money from government institutions that have become notorious for non-payment. CHRA, however, said in its letter to Tsvangirai that Cross was detached from reality.
“Cross argues for pre-paid water meters because nearly half of the revenue of all local authorities is derived from water sales. This point is self-contradictory. If local authorities are making so much money from the sale of water, why have they not invested in water infrastructure?” queried CHRA in the letter.
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“Our reading is that there is no corresponding investment to rates paid by residents. The MDC must care to know that the City of Harare has not produced its audit reports since 2008 and yet they still expect people to pay rates.”
In the letter, CHRA shot down Cross’s argument that pre-paid water meters would lead to improved revenue generation by local authorities.
“There is no guarantee and we are not convinced that any increase in revenue will lead to an increase and improvements in water supply. There is a lot of naked corruption in local authorities, in particular, the City of Harare, which militates against effective and efficient delivery of services,” said the residents’ group.
“The MDC-T must be ashamed of itself for even raising this point considering that Harare and most urban local authorities are actually controlled by its councillors.”
