Water consumers owe LWSC K140m

Sat, 07 Jan 2017 10:20:47 +0000

By KALOBWE BWALYA

WATER consumers in Lusaka owe Lusaka Water and Sewerage Company (LWSC) a staggering K140 million in unpaid water bills, company managing director Sylvester Mashamba has said.

Dr. Mashamba said as a result the water utility was having serious challenges to improve service delivery to  its customers.

He said the company’s cash flow was adversely affected by non –payment of water bills by domestic and commercial customers.

Speaking at a media briefing in Lusaka yesterday, Dr Mashamba said the operating environment had continued to be affected by a number of external factors that impacted negatively on the operations of the company, which included spill over drought from 2014/ 2015 rainy season and the economic instability.

He said water production was also adversely affected by depleting water sources on account of delayed and reduced rainfall.

He said further said the company water supply target could not be attained because of continued electricity load shedding on ground water sources and pumping station.

“With the current, daily average water demand for Lusaka standing at 420,000m3 per day, LWSC could only manage a meagre 230,000m3 per day. This led to the Company recording a reduction in sale which resulted in 14 billing below budget,” he said.

Dr Mashamba said the company had to put in measures to contain the situation and ensure stability and equitable supply of water to customers within the limitations, therefore the company had continued with water rationing programme to ensure equitable distribution of water to all its customers.

He however said, despite the challenges  that the company was grappled with, the water utility firm managed to register about 3, 000  new connections translating in over 30, 000 people getting access to clean safe drinking water during the year 2016.

“The company continue to record progress in implementation of various projects such as the launch of the construction of the Kafue bulk water project worth U$ 150 million that will see us brining to Lusaka an additional 50 million litres of water per day and also the Lusaka water supply sanitation and drainage project (LWSSDP) is progressing well under the millennium challenge corporation (MCC) he said.

He said the construction work also included a new water treatment plant, booster station in a Chilanga and pipeline of about 56 kilometer from Kafue to Lusaka  and it is expected to completed in the next  20 months , hence 30 % of the works have been done.

Dr Mashamba hoped that this year the company would be able to recover the unpaid debts, and to finish up with the projects that it had embarked on so that it fulfilled it mandate of supplying  water and providing sanitation service to the general public.