THE Environmental Management Agency (EMA) has raised concern over the delay by Bulawayo City Council (BCC) to rehabilitate the Sauerstown sewer system, saying the delay will end up causing serious casualties.
BY MTHANDAZO NYONI/SHARON SIBINDI
BCC is currently working on a project to rehabilitate collapsed outfall sewers so as to convey all the sewage to the treatment plants and works after EMA threatened to take it to court over allegations of polluting Umguza River.
The process also includes the rehabilitation of sewage treatment plants to optimal levels to ensure reclaimed water is not harmful to plants, humans and fish in the rivers.
“Yes, work is going on, but at a slow pace considering the urgency it deserves in terms of pollution. What we are interested in is containing the pollution and churning everything to the treatment plant which is working,” EMA provincial manager for Bulawayo Metropolitan province, Decent Ndlovu, told journalists during a media tour on Wednesday.
“We cannot continue saying something is happening for years. We need this to be addressed within the shortest possible time. Last time they said they will be through by November (2016) and now they are talking of September. It’s taking time.
“So I’m appealing to the policymakers to ensure that these resources are allocated accordingly so that they are prioritised and we have the issue of effluent management being addressed as a matter of urgency before we are affected by a number of calamities,” he said.
Council spokesperson Nesisa Mpofu said the work could not be done overnight.
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“A lot has been done by the city to rectify pollution. I know that when people say the sewer burst or there are lot of collapses regarding sewers sometimes they did not see the amount of work that council has done,” Mpofu said.
“When we look at the digging and the trenching that is underway, you can see that it is intensive and also the amount of investments. We are looking at over $10 million that we are using as the municipality to ensure that we can efficiently discharge our sewage to the treatment works,” she said.
Government in 2014 dispatched a team of experts to Umguza to check on water quality and the impact of the contaminated water on the agricultural activities and inhabitants within the Umguza area.
This follows a 2009 study by the National University of Science and Technology which indicated that fish collected from Umguza Dam had high levels of metals than that from other dams.
