Interview: Tearfund on Zimbabwe Water Crisis

Last week Christian humanitarian agency Tearfund announced it was preparing to supply twenty 5000-litre water tanks to churches around Bulawayo in Zimbabwe where a severe water crisis has hit the city.

The Zimbabwean Government said earlier in the month that it would not be intervening in the situation, leaving desperate city dwellers with nowhere else to turn for water but to the churches.

Christian Today spoke to Karyn Beattie, Tearfund's Disaster Management Officer for Southern Africa, who will fly to Zimbabwe on Thursday to meet Tearfund's partners and see the work that they are doing to bring water to those in need.


CT: Just how bad is the situation there right now?

KB: There have been a number of civil society groups as well as our own partners who have been flagging up the issue since the start of the year. In March of this year, the Government declared a drought and Bulawayo was one of the worst affected, so we have known there was going to be a water problem all along.

The civil society groups, our partners included, have been asking the government and the Bulawayo city council 'what are you going to do?' and have not gotten a response. So now they have got to the stage where they feel they have to do something by themselves.

CT: People are going to the churches for water, but presumably the churches are struggling themselves to find water?

KB: Yes indeed. They are struggling just like everyone else to find water and electricity. But they have the infrastructure to be able to put water points through the suburbs, so despite their difficulties they felt they were well placed to respond.




CT: And Tearfund is giving some kind of support to the churches in that?

KB: Yes. They are going to buy 5,000-litre water tanks and position them at twenty different churches and each week they will buy water to fill up those tanks, sourcing the water from private water sources. Some people are using the crisis to make money and so are selling the water. Have you ever heard of anything so horrific? So we are going to help them with the cost of the fuel for the tanks and purchase the water so that the people who come to them for water won't have to pay. The churches will also make a contribution and there are also well-wishers in the Bulawayo area who are offering their boreholes.

CT: Why has this crisis arisen? Is it simply a lack of rain?

KB: It's a combination of things. It is a lack of rain because the rains are affecting the amount of water that there is, but more complicated than that is also the situation in the country right now. There has been some political wrangling going on between the Bulawayo city council and the government department for water because they have been demanding that the Zimbabwean national water authority take over the supply of water for the Bulawayo area. Bulawayo city council, however, is trying to resist that because they have not seen a very good track record from the national water authority.

The economic situation is having a large impact on water as well because the departments like the water authorities don't have the funding to repair broken pumps or pipes, and the inflation is having a massive effect on the ability of the government to actually deliver water.

But it is a very serious situation because it is very uncommon to receive an emergency appeal to receive water outside of a conflict or natural disaster situation - it is unheard of. So it is quite a serious situation.

CT: Is the effect of this being felt by the rich as well as the poor?

KB: They are but probably less by the rich because they will have a borehole already or can actually buy from someone who has a borehole. They also have vehicles so they can go around and find water. But it's not only a matter of having money to buy things, and also storage, the containers, but it is the enormous amount of time it takes to collect and source water.

CT: This must have quite serious health implications?

KB: We haven't had an outbreak of cholera yet in the Bulawayo area but there have been in other parts of the country. In some cases, the quality of the water that people are drawing is not good at all. There are also a lot of people digging latrines in their gardens and in some places they are also trying to dig a shallow well. So obviously when you've got sewage seepage into a water well, that doesn't bode well and we are expecting those kind of outbreaks to increase.

CT: So does that mean that this water crisis is affecting other cities?

KB: Yes it is very badly affecting cities across the nation. There was a cholera outbreak already in the town of Kadoma. Harare, Kadoma, Masvingo, there are just all sorts of places where people don't have water.

CT: What kind of way out is there to this situation?

KB: I think it is quite a complex situation and until Zimbabwe has an accountable and good government, we as NGOs and churches and Christians can do as much as we can to help people on the ground but at the end of the day we have only limited resources. And the people on the ground don't want hand outs, they want to rebuild their lives. There are arguments over whether the government will help Bulawayo with water at the same time as the president is giving out brand new Mercedes to all of his ministers. So what can you do?

I think there needs to be some real political will for things to be reformed and changed. And that doesn't mean there needs to be an entirely new government, it just means it has to have a change of attitude. But I think Zimbabwe needs a good and accountable government that cares about its people, and at the moment it is not clear that they do.

We're just trying to do all we can to help our partners on the ground. And it is so good to see the partners because in spite of how hard it is, they are always so full of faith and hope and it is always quite inspiring. In spite of how difficult - and how sad - the situation is, it is really good to see the churches and Christians one and full of hope.

In their daily lives they are struggling as well. They don't have the water either, so they are also trying to come up with solutions and find sugar and maize and oil and all the rest of it. We are praying for grace and strength for them.