WATER1Ruth Butaumocho
Forty-two-year old Mrs Anna Makoni joins the long winding queue of women and children waiting to collect water for household use in a small riverbed well.
Although it is still 4am, the water queue is already stretching for more than two kilometres and more people are coming to the watering hole, hoping for an opportunity to collect at least a bucket or two for their households before the well dries up.

On the other side of the Nyamasahwa River –  which provides the only river bed well perched between two granite stones – a visibly thirsty herd of cattle is edging closer to the river, waiting for its turn to quench thirst from the same well. A few metres upstream a few goats lick the sand to quench their thirsty.

The above scenario has become a common feature in most parts of Buhera district, where crippling water shortages are threatening more than 5 000 villagers.

While in some areas villagers have to walk for more than seven kilometers to fetch water, people in Makoni, Magidi, Kuvenga Muguta, Dhambe villages under Headman Murambinda can fetch water from a small well on the bed of Nyamasahwa, which they have since christened “Tsime Reruponeso”.

The heavy rains that fell in the area in the last few months have not alleviated their problem, but only offered temporary relief. The heavily silted rivers would only flow for a few days after a heavy downpour before the water was swallowed by the sand.

It is good that they still can get water from the watering hole as the river bed will soon dry up sometime in May.

Villagers say they have been facing the same problem for the past 40 years. Politicians have not helped matters as they have failed to honour promises to drill boreholes in the area.

There are already fears of an escalation of water-borne diseases such as diarrhoea and cholera reminiscent of 2008, where many villagers succumbed to the outbreaks.

“Getting water for household use is a battle, especially during the dry season when everything else dries up save for parts of  Nyamasahwa River,” said Mrs Esther Taderera of Kuvenga Village.

“We now live in fear of possible outbreak of diseases like cholera, because every week several cases of people, mainly children, suffer from diarrhoea,” she said.

The villagers have stopped hoping for an intervention from local leadership and the Government and are now pinning their hopes on riverbed wells, which are also very scarce and spread far between in the district.

Though considered unsafe water, burrowed riverbed wells have been the villagers’ only reliable source of water for generations.

“I started getting water from this river in 1992 after relocating to this area. Then my first child was only two but now I am a grandmother and I still use the same road, join the same queue and continue to wait for hours for my turn to collect water from this well,” said 41-year old Mrs Makoni.

Everyday Mrs Makoni has to walk for more than three kilometres with a bucket on her head bringing home water for a household use.

When the situation is severe, the Makoni family has to forego bathing and put the water to good use.

“Kufunga zvekugeza, nguva yatava kuenda iyi madanha chaiwo (Bathing will soon become a luxury in the coming months,” she said.

In most of the villagers, the shortage has assumed the form of a “perennial water famine,” a situation that has been exacerbated by shortage of food in this semi-arid region, known for crop failure every year.

Mr Givemore Matunya, whose homestead is a stone’s throw away from the well, takes turns with other villagers to clean it to prevent water contamination and also ensure that it doesn’t run out of water.

He says he has been doing this ritual for the past 20 years.

“Water shortage in the area is well known. Since the early 1980’s we have engaged successive Members of Parliament to help resolve the crisis, but nothing has materialised.”

The well also services pupils and staff from the two neighbouring schools – Murambinda A primary and secondary schools.

“At one time we were told to mould bricks with promises that a borehole would be drilled to service the area, but that never happened. We even engaged an international non-governmental organisation to look into our problem, after realising that the local leadership had failed us, but again nothing happened,” he said.

Headman Mr Pedzisai Murambinda, who oversees over 42 villages, concurred with villagers, saying water shortage has become a human tragedy in the area.

“We don’t have a reliable source of water in the area, and that alone has affected the implementation of several income generating projects that we would want to undertake,” he said.

He bemoaned lack of investment in the area, which he says could have improved the water situation, bettering the lives of villagers.

“There is room to improve the water situation in the area by drilling boreholes and water canals so that we can focus on other developmental projects that are not necessarily farming.

“Our area is not suitable for crops like maize but for small grains. Government and other development partners should come in and avail funding for the completion of Marovanyati Dam, whose construction was abandoned a long time ago,” he said.

Headman Murambinda said the problem of water in rural areas could not be dealt with in isolation without looking at the impact it has on agriculture.

“Already the district faces perennial food shortages because of water shortages, a situation that can be addressed once Government invests in water infrastructure. We are appealing to government and well wishers to come to our rescue.”

And until someone comes to their rescue, villagers in some parts of Buhera will have to continue fetching water in their traditional, unsafe but reliable riverbed wells.

 

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