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ON arrival at the Casabanana section of Porta village on the outskirts of Harare one is hit by a powerful smell emanating from rivulets of raw sewage meandering through the compound.
But most of the residents are unperturbed saying they have become accustomed to the stench as the sewage has been flowing for the past five years.
The 178 families have to hop and skip to avoid splashing in streams of human waste every day after four septic tanks started overflowing in 2005. Despite repeated appeals to the Harare City Council, there has been no reaction from the city authorities.
Built by a private construction company, the compound was meant to provide temporary shelter for workers contracted to lay a pipeline that connects the Morton Jaffray water works to Darwendale dam a few years ago.
On a daily basis children play in the water seemingly oblivious of the danger of water-borne diseases such as cholera and typhoid, which have claimed scores of lives in Harare’s poor settlements over the years.
Some of the more enterprising residents are doing roaring business selling dried fish, a few metres from the septic tanks.
“We survive by the grace of God,” said Nelson Mangezi, a fish monger.
“We have been living like this for more than five years now and if it wasn’t for God’s mercy we would have died.”
His sentiments were shared by many of the residents who spoke to The Standard recently when the Combined Harare Residents’ Association (CHRA) joined them as they battled to empty the septic tanks.
“Most of us staying here were construction workers and the company that we worked for built these wooden shacks for us as temporary shelters more than 10 years ago,” said Goodwill Mutogo.
“This was supposed to be temporary shelter but we have been here ever since. Some of us now even have families and the living arrangements are no longer conducive.
“The city council has been promising to allocate us stands to us but nothing has materialised. I think they have even forgotten that we exist,” he said. To avert a possible health hazard CHRA hired a waste removal truck to empty the septic tanks.
Barnabas Mangodza, the CHRA CEO said they had to intervene to avert a health disaster.
“What was happening here is really sad and pathetic,” Mangodza said.
“People have been living in their own waste and it is really a miracle that there has not been a major disease outbreak.
“These people have been paying rates and council has actually been sending letters of final demand to some of these residents yet there is no service delivery here.”
Glen Norah councillor and chairman of the Environmental Management committee, Herbert Gomba said the plight of the Casabanana residents required urgent attention.
“The situation here is very bad. I was pained when I saw children playing in the dirty water,” he said.
“We certainly need to do more as the city council for this community to prevent a disease outbreak now that I am aware of this.”
Raw sewage has become a common sight in Harare’s high-density suburbs such as Mufakose, Mabvuku, Tafara, Mbare, Highfield, Glen Norah and Dzivarasekwa, according to CHRA.
In some areas, residents had resorted to digging drainage trenches across their yards to prevent raw sewage from flowing into their homes.
The frequent bursts of sewer pipes has been blamed on ageing infrastructure, which is long past its lifespan and on increasing pressure caused by a growing population.
A series of cholera and typhoid outbreaks have done little to spur the government to deal with the problem that has spread to almost every urban centre in Zimbabwe.
BY BERTHA SHOKO
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