Residents scramble for water as Gwanda runs dry

Residents of Gwanda have gone on a scramble for water as the town enters its fourth day without a drop of water.

The town has been without water since Friday evening allegedly because the Council is repairing the main water pipe supplying water to the town. The pipe in question has been leaking water for over five years.

Sources within the council's engineering department claim that Council decided to repair the pipe on Friday a job which was anticipated to take no more than three hours. The sources however claim that the job could not be completed on time as it was discovered that a wrong size replacement pipe had been acquired and brought to site.

The sources further claim that some of the material which was meant to have been used in doing the repair work also delayed getting to site which forced work to be suspended over the weekend.

Residents expressed their anger at the local authority describing Council as disorganised and poor planners.

Zenzo Sibanda a resident in the town said he was shocked by the council's poor planning on doing the repair work.

"This pipe has been leaking for almost five years and when they decided to do the work they do it so disorganised. Does it mean that in five years they couldn't think of ways of doing this work without inconveniencing us like this?" he said.

"Logic will tell you that Council should have brought all the material to site before digging and cutting the pipe and anyway how does a wrong size pipe find its way from Bulawayo to site and only discovered to be wrong size when it's time to fit it," fumed the resident.

Meanwhile, hundreds of residents have been scrambling for the precious liquid at the very few boreholes in the town.

Comment could not be sourced from Council as questions were referred to the Town Clerk who was said to be out of office.