Lilongwe Water Board general manager Rodrick Gonani says his organisation is losing K1 billion (about $2.5m) due to non-revenue water which is lost due to vandalism and ageing pipes.
Speaking in an interview after opening a meeting the board had with Water Users Associations (WUAs) in Lilongwe on Saturday, Gonani said there was need to increase awareness to the residents of the city because vandalism affects thousands of people who fail to access water for both domestic and industrial use.
“Over the past years, we were losing about 39 percent of our water through vandalism but we have now curbed the situation and we losing only 30 percent. Even though we seem to be winning this battle the amount of money we could have got if sold the water could be more than K1 billion,” said Gonani.
Apart from vandalism Gonani also said rapid urbanisation in the city is making the job of distributing water to all parts of the city a big challenge.
“We have already finalised plans of raising the Kamuzu Dam 1 at Malingunde so that we are able to store double the amount of water we are storing now. After raising the dam our next big project is the construction of the Diamphwe Dam along the Dedza and Lilongwe border which is going to give us enough water for many years to come,” said Gonani.
He said that the Diamphwe Dam will need 200 million euros (K122 billion) to be completed and that the European Investment Bank has already shown interest to provide half of the funds.
On the objsctive of the meeting with the WUAs, Gonani said the meeting was important because the water usesrs are part of the company and whatever happens in their area affects the company as well.
“We wanted to sensitise them on good customers care and how to solve problems if there are any because they are the image of the board in their respective area. Being one organisation we need to speak one language,” said Gonani.
