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Midlands Correspondent

GWERU City Council is discharging 30 mega-litres of raw sewer into Gweru River, the Environmental Management Agency has revealed. The river is the main source of water for villagers in Lower Gweru. There are problems at the city’s two sewer treatment plants at Outfall and Kamprisha. EMA provincial manager for Midlands Mr Milton Muusha told The Herald yesterday that the agency had been forced to take council to court over the issue.“We did establish sometime back that about 30 ML was being discharged into Gweru River by council. After several engagements with the local authority without success, we have had to enforce the law by issuing a number of orders and issued tickets to have them rectify the situation to no avail,” he said

“This led us to a situation where we had to take council to court and as we speak we have four court cases, two of which have been finalised with the local authority being found guilty on both cases.”

Mr Muusha said in the first case council was found guilty of polluting Gweru River from sewage coming from Outfall Treament Plant.

It was fined $700. In the other case council was fined another $700 after being found guilty of polluting Runde River from raw sewage coming from Southview Pump Station.

The two outstanding cases involve raw sewage flowing from Kamprisha Treatment Plant into the environment without proper treatment and Woodlands suburb where the sewer system has collapsed. Chairperson of the Gweru Commission Mr Tsunga Mhangami is adamant that council complied with EMA’s order.

“All the raw sewage was being discharged into Gweru River but that has been corrected now as the raw sewage is now being deposited into council sewer dams and council will shortly try to irrigate agricultural land adjacent to Pakamisa Dam using the treated sewage,” he said.