Harare to ration water in wealthy suburbs as typhoid cases rise

Maybe they’ll start with the homes of government ministers, and Mugabe’s Mansion.

Yeah right.

A headline in today’s Herald reads: More typhoid outbreaks imminent. More than 1,000 cases of typhoid have already been reported in Harare, as the epidemic worsens this year.

Last week, we sent a text message to our subscribers asking how typhoid had affected their communities, and what they thought government should do. The map below shares those responses we received which we were able to locate geographically. Click once on a point to view the comment caption, then click on the right arrow to view the comment in detail. Double click to zoom in. Or select view larger map to more easily interact with the map.

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In their own words, here is some of what our subscribers say:

• Typhoid spread to the whole country. The help we receive was not good at all
• The government must ensure adequate safe water supplies throughout all the towns. Where some areas are not connected with pipelines of water supply, there is need for supply of chemicals to treaty their sources of water.
• No cases recorded yet here in Chipinge. Local authorities must ensure clean water, regular refuse collection, attend to sewage leaks.
• The government shld close the areas until they r sure that the areas r safe and clean
• The government should with immediate effect stop vending of foodstuffs and should partner the city council to ensure that residents receive safe drinking water and rubbish strewn everywhere be collected.
• “I live in a small community called Hatcliffe which is situated about 24km from the CBD just after the flamboyant suburb Borrowdale. Since year 2000 we have been experiencing water shortages, we only get water once per fortnight, backyard wells (migodhi) are common in most houses. For the past 11years we have never drank safe water, the city council even worsens the situation by not addressing our problem. Cholera came and went with a few cases reported, but now typhoid is affecting our way of life. Infection by typhoid is inevitable as the only sources of water the people have are contaminated.
• WHAT THE GOVERNMENT MUST DO? They should at least supply our small community with clean tap water twice or thrice a week.”
• The government must ensure that no vendors must sell food which is not packaged, hygiene should be maintained in every sector of our society.
• It is sad and alarming with the rate at which people are suffering and affected by typhoid. I feel scared to visit those areas affected by the disease or even to drink their water when I am thirst. We should educate each other on how to keep our environment clean by not littering and proper disposal of waste. Keeping our water safe for cooking and drinking and even remind each other to wash our hands before handling food and after visiting the toilet. Our government has to take measures to protect us by giving us clean treated water. Also to see that all refuse is collected.
• The government shld clear al the areas which r affected until they r sure that the areas r clean and ready
• Functional public toilets, proper collection of refuse, safe water to drink and people should eat warm food, wash hands before eating and wash fruits
• I’m affected by typhoid from illegal vendors who are operating at open places selling foods like fish contaminated with flies. However as one of the affected people I urge government, especially council workers to repair all the burst sewage pipes
• Any responsible gvt takes the health of its citizens seriously except for the Zim gvt. Ministers are busy enriching themselves when we have piles & piles of refuse in all our cities & raw sewage is being discharged into the main water sources. Pathetic.
• Just the thought of it is FRIGHTENING. Talk 2 family friends colleagues about the wrongs and rights of cleanliness when food water is around us. Govt should be out there educating vendors not just destroying their stands
• Typhoid has affected us in Harare because the water drinking is not safe. Refuse must be collected time to time. Burst pipes water or sewage must also be repaired.
• Our children are at risk at school in Kuwadzana.
• Electricity and water should always be there so that people should eat hot food and using water after visiting the toilet
• It affected me badly, after al there was no medication at the clinic near my place, gvt should establish adequate health facility
• The government must do something to keep the town clean.
• Disposal of refuse to correct place ,clean water no to water cuts, educate people & city councils should repair sewage in time ,market places for vendors.
• Government must abolish mushrooming Food outlets and improve water and sewer system.
• It has affected two my family members. We can help each by encouraging good housekeeping and hygiene. The government must see that all drinking water is being treated and jobs being created to reduce more vendors on the streets.
• Govt must source funds to address the problem it spreads to other cities. The problem is about sewage which is out of control.
• Government has 2 educate people
• Typhoid is real a scare people should make sure they drink clean water, and the government should set an awareness campaign
• Government should intervene and force council to provide us with clean water always councils is to make sure that our areas are clean from flies they should spray rubbish bins and rubbish are people should drink treated water, wash hands and use soap
• Stop corruption. Restore law and order and these problems will fall away as things would be properly run
• It affected us so much the movement should make sure that people are getting clean water plus make sure sewer is moving no leaks.
• Gvt must make tap-water and domestic waste must be collected regularly, further to make environment clean.
• Untimely deaths & unnecessary medical expenses. Government should take action not put blame on anyone or institution.
• The entire is in the local authorities. Our councils are too corrupt, awarding themselves heft salaries and wages and forget about water systems. The gvt has to back on the drawing board, get rid of politicians and install competent pple to municipalities.
• I cant believe Hwange is just  a few kilometres from the mighty Zambezi river but we don’t have water in our houses. ”Zimbabwe nyika yakanaka”
• Am a nurse in Kadoma. We had confirmed cases of cholera and plenty other diarrhoeal case that are keeping us rather busy. Most cases coming from Rimuka.
• I am typhoid free but the government should provide clean water to the public .
• Typhoid must be prevented starting by personal hygiene. Government must educate people & spray all contaminated areas cause its a waterborne disease.
• Raise the alarm quickly and ask the international community to help.
• Not affected yet all stakeholders to be involved clear garbage stop food selling fish water needs genuine treatment
• Typhoid hasn’t affected me. I must encourage each other to drink treated clean water. Gvt must work with NGOs to provide people with clean water.
• The government to allow donor intervention.

Attorney General Johannes Tomana has rubbished recent media reports regarding the reappointment of Augstine Chihuri as Police Commissioner General by the President.

President Mugabe is the only person with the mandate to appoint or reappoint the Commissioner-General of Police and other constitutional bodies without consulting anyone except the Public Service Commission

Tomana uses a superfluous semantic argument about the legal differences between appointment and re-appointment in the constitution. Truthfully, he needn’t have wasted his breath.

The MDC is trying to exercise Subsection 20.1.3 (p) of the Constitution of Zimbabwe Amendment (No. 19)Act, 2008 states that the President:

in consultation with the Prime Minister, makes key appointments the President is required to make under and in terms of the Constitution or any Act of Parliament;

Where “in consultation” is defined in Amendment 19 as meaning that the President is required to consult and secure the agreement or consent of the person consulted. In this case the Prime Minister.

However, Chapter IX Section 93(2) of the Constitution which deals with the appointment of the Police Commissioner General requires that any appointments to this position be made “after consultation with such person or authority as may be prescribed by or under an Act of Parliament”. In other words, the President may appoint, or re-appoint as his whims dictate.

In an audit of the Global political Agreement Dereck Matyszak notes that the MDC placed undue emphasis on gaining control of the Ministry of Home affairs which administers the Police Act. Given the number of lawyers amongst the MDC’s Party officials it is surprising that they were unaware that only the President and Police Commissioner General determine appointments within the Police Force, while the Attorney General may -Commissioner General to direct the Police Commissioner General to investigate criminal offences and he as the final say over  prosecutions. I’m sure that the MDC-T is very aware that the Attorney General, Mr Tomana, serves at the pleasure of the President.

In the beginning of the MDC-Ts formal relationship with ZANU PF Mr Tsvangirai has the opportunity to exert the authority of his office. He neglected to do so in favour of political expediency. MDC-T will of course cry foul to anyone who’ll listen over Chihuri’s inevitable re-appointment. They may even threaten to pull out of the Inclusive Government and throw themselves on the ground in front of Zuma and SADC begging that their boo-boo be fixed and the world made right again. They have only themselves to blame.

In concluding his introduction to the audit, Mr Matsyszak wrote:

No one should be surprised by the failure of the GPA to open democratic space. The chain of command over the instruments of state repression was unaltered.

Made rounds in my old neighbourhood the other weekend and had a mini tour of the favourite haunts of the old boys. Still found the usual crowd and met some ladies I knew back then from the generation of my elder siblings. I knew them then as selling their souls to the Devil as some ultra-Purists would put it, no doubt to the ire of feminist writers and scholars – and Hon. Tabitha Khumalo even! I found them still at it, ostensibly enjoying lagers which they apparently liked hot because it seemed to take them hours to down a 330ml pint of their “favourite” booze! But then I learnt a long time ago that it is always easy to moralise about these issues and expose your own hypocrisy, yet it got me thinking about the dynamics of economics meets want, want meets disease and how we as mere mortals can tread that very thin line and come out of it all unscathed.

The thing is that I am one of many people who have over the years been diagnosing folks ailing from whatever ailment by just looking them. And the advent and eventual ubiquity of HIV/Aids became easy play for me and other such types. So it was here during my little pub crawl that I met these two ladies who this one time were at the centre of ghetto gossip that they were literally die-hard types seeing virtually all their friends and former lovers had succumbed to HIV/Aids. And the two were themselves at one time written off because of their poor health with every Simba and Saru seeming to be in the know that they each had one foot in the grave because they were visibly ailing “with all the signs of HIV/Aids.” Yet here they were looking as strong as horses and obviously loving the attention from the ogling eyes of all types – skinny tipplers with rapidly aging faces because of rabid gulps of undiluted spirits, and the pot-bellied types who seem to flaunt this rotund protrusion of their abdomens as a sign of living the life. But I figure living the lie is more like it! So as I stopped by for a chat, and naturally perhaps, they asked that I buy them a couple of pints of lager and I obliged, perhaps like people who last saw each other do. Just as I was placing the beers in front of them, a chap I knew back in the day as having gone to school with one of my older brothers came along carrying three pints of lager. Pleased to see him, I extended my greetings, but the chap was mysteriously peeved, pointing a finger at me with words like “wena mfana wena” which translates to “you young man, you better watch out.” Turns out he wasn’t concerned about my health seeing the company I was in! The three lagers were in fact for him and the two prostitutes! Turns out he was imagining I was muscling in on his action as the two laughed out and told him “no, no, no, he is our younger brother!”

This little incident got me thinking about the dynamics of HIV/Aids and how easily it spreads. If this chap was pissed off seeing me talking to these women, he surely knew that he had competition from other young men who couldn’t wait to take the ladies home for some good old hanky panky as soon as he took his eyes off them! I am a product of these mean streets where prejudice seems to be second nature, where sex and cash have a logic of their own, yet there are issues that remain etched in one’s mind that tend to present one as a sanctimonious prick even, yet for me, the greatest tragedy of our time is not HIV/Aids in itself, but how some individuals have come to accept HIV/Aids as an inevitable “gamble” every sexually active adult has to live with. Once upon a time as a naïve young man I thought I had all the answers to the world’s problems, now as a grown man with kids of my own, I take some time off to mingle with other adults and I wonder if my juvenile idealism still has a place at all in this cruel world. Am I moralising? Maybe. Am I worried what kind of world my three little boys will grow up in? Damn right I am! But what can I do? I just watch the world pass me by and muse “what if?”

Every year people like to set goals and resolutions but as the year progresses we lose out on the implementation part. In order to motivate and share ideas on the art of goal setting DefZee in collaboration with US Embassy started the year with a talk called “Screw it Let’s Do It”. The theme of the seminar was borrowed from a book by Richard Branson. To some people the theme of the seminar may sound dirty but from just a few minutes of presentations from the facilitators you end getting motivated to embark on your goals and resolutions for the year. A well picked panel of some of Zimbabwe’s finest entrepreneurs consisted of Fungai James Tichawangana the founder of a popular entertainment site ZimboJam and Rudo Nyagulu a lawyer by profession and founder of Ethos and Stimulus group gave testimony and motivation to the audience on how they started their businesses and the importance of setting goals and achieving the best in life.

Starting something from scratch is the most difficult thing especially in an unfriendly environment and some people are scared of taking risks. The key to goal setting is your ability to turn vision into reality.

Creating SMART goals also involves passion and getting over the default mindset of defeat before you even start. Goals can be set according to your timeframe; some can be short term (0-6 months), medium term (6-18 months) and long term (18-24 months). With no time frame tied to your goals it means there is no sense of urgency and you may end up relaxing. A specific goal has a greater chance of being accomplished than a general goal. Measure your progress so that you stay on track. The reason why some goals are not attainable is because they are not realistic. Like for example to start a business in Zimbabwe you need to have capital and to get a loan from a bank requires one to have collateral which you might not have. So if your goal is to own an operational company by the end of the year the chances are high that your goal won’t be realised in one year. So set goals that are specific, measurable, attainable, realistic and timely.

The event gave motivation especially to those aspiring entrepreneurs as it provided the opportunity to learn from the best. According to Richard Branson “looking, listening, learning – these are things we should do all our lives, not just at school”. The food for thought session created the space for members of the public to hear live testimonies from people who started from scratch but with a “screw it, let’s do it” attitude they ended up creating something.

Taking action against a Typhoid outbreak, which to date has had 900 reported cases, the City of Harare hastily dispatched Municipal Police to contain the spread of the disease by closing down Mereki, a popular braai spot in Warren Park. So far city and government health officials have named fish, raw meat sold in butcheries and fruits and vegetables for sale from open air vendors and people’s markets as vectors of the Salmonella Typhi bacterium. Authorities even went so far as to issue a statement saying that water was not the problem in this outbreak. According to the World Health Organisation, water, or in this case the lack of it, is the cause of a typhoid outbreak.

Water and sanitation delivery services have been poor at best and nonexistent at worst in all of the areas affected by Typhoid. Health officials report that cases have been found in Chitungwiza, Epworth, Dzivarasekwa, Budiriro and Warren Park. The epicentre of the outbreak is said to be in Kuwadzana. Residents of all these areas have complained vociferously to anyone who would listen about erratic water delivery, sewerage flowing unabated in the streets, zero refuse collection by the city and the decrepit state of their public ablution facilities. Given this set of circumstances it is surprising that outbreak is not more severe.