The Sunday News
Dumisani Nsingo, Senior Business Reporter
THE HWANGE Local Board has signed a Memorandum of Agreement (MoA) with the Infrastructural Development Bank of Zimbabwe (IDBZ) which will pave way for massive infrastructural development estimated to cost about $6 million before the end of the month.
The local authority’s engineer, Eng Philip Nguni, said the infrastructural development project which would entail servicing of new residential stands and rehabilitating of a waste water plant was expected to start soon.
He said this at a media tour of the Baobab waste water treatment plant organised by the Environmental Management Agency (Ema) on Friday.
“As Hwange Local board we recently signed a MoA for the water and sewer reticulation and road construction project for Empumalanga West as well as the rehabilitation of Empumalanga waste water treatment plant. That project is due to start in the next week or two because we are at a stage where we are preparing to give instructions to contractors to start the work. The total cost for the whole project its $ 5,8 million,” he said.
The servicing of the 2 145 residential stands at Empumalanga
West was stopped last year as beneficiaries struggled to raise funds to start work at the site.
“The major challenge that we had was mainly to do with payments, beneficiaries were not paying timeously and because of that contractors then stopped work. So for about a year or so we had no activities on the ground. We are so excited about this partnership with IDBZ which will see sustained efforts and activities on the ground without any stoppages,” said Eng Nguni.
He said the funding by IDBZ would go a long way in rehabilitating Empumalanga waste water treatment plant which has not been functioning since the Zimbabwe National Water Authority took over its management from the local authority in 2007.
The Empumalanga waste water treatment plant treats waste from 6704 households from Empumalanga high density suburb.
“The Empumalanga waste water treatment plant is basically a non-functional plant and it has not been functioning for the last 10 years, so as a local authority we are actually polluting the environment and we are so excited that at least we would be able to rehabilitate that,” said Eng Nguni.
HLB chief executive officer Mr Ndumiso Mdlalose confirmed the latest developments.
“We will be moving in the next few weeks to rehabilitate Empumalanga waste water plant, we also want to power it on solar. Then there is also another IDBZ project which is starting in a few weeks time where we expect servicing through providing tarred roads. We are also looking at water and sewer reticulation and then lighting. We have emphasised that there should be solar street lights.
“Teaming with IDBZ, we have banks who then want to build houses. So the banks themselves will provide fully serviced stands and beneficiaries of those stands will have an option of tapping into mortgages for construction of houses from some banks that will have partnered with the IDBZ,” said Mr Mdlalose said.
He also said there was another financial institution that had shown interest in purchasing land from the local authority for the construction of a minimum of about 500 core-housing units. Mr Mdlalose said infrastructural development at its proposed Civic Centre would start before the end of the year. The 12,5-hectare Civic Centre, which is expected to be Hwange’s first Central Business District was proposed three-years ago as part of the local authority’s drive to attain township status.
Hwange has been without a focal point since its founding in 1899, with the apportioning of land being done by big companies namely Hwange Colliery Company Limited (HCCL), Zimbabwe Electricity Supply Authority’s subsidiary Zimbabwe Power Company (ZPC) and the National Railways of Zimbabwe (NRZ).
“We will be moving our offices and departments to the (Civic Centre) site before the end of the year. We have already courted some companies that want to partner with us to start building that infrastructure because we need that infrastructure desperately especially if we are earmarking for upgrading our status, whether to a town or municipality or otherwise which is underway,” said Mr Mdlalose.
He said a number of investors had purchased land at the proposed Civic Centre site with some having started to construction activities.
“We are still open and inviting investors to come in and put up infrastructure for the Central Business District whether it is your business operating, shops, malls, garages and all other services that you would require in an urban set-up. So we are still casting our net as far as we can,” said Mr Mdlalose.
He said the local authority through Government, has successfully discussed the issue of incorporating the other eight wards that are under HCCL and NRZ and ZPC.
“It has been agreed generally that come 2018 they will be administered under Local Board which means we will be administering 15 wards which includes the provision of services and general planning for the whole town. To us that is a plus, not so much for council alone but for the residents as well because prior to this arrangement the residents in the eight wards which were not under the jurisdiction of council were not benefiting from the Government resources . . . township status would further enhance Hwange’s economic growth.
“We are also looking from an investor point of view, running the whole set-up under a town or municipality inspires confidence even in terms of property value, people can now invest with confidence because you are now not limited to the lifespan of the mine because under a town comes other investment opportunities other than the mining activities and so forth.”
Speaking on the newly rehabilitated Baobab waste water treatment plant Ema Matabeleland North provincial manager Mrs Chipo Mpofu-Zuze said it was a major step towards reducing effluent discharge to the environment. -@DNsingo
