Residents puzzled as Masaka  water crisis enters third week

Residents of Masaka City have entered a third week without piped water.

Water supply in the city got interrupted in the last  week of November after one of the National Water and Sewerage Corporation (NWSC) main reservoirs at Nabajjuzi Swamp burst.

Mr Emmanuel Nuwamanya, the NWSC Masaka branch manager   confirmed the problem on Sunday but said “their engineers have repaired the damaged reservoir and water supply will resume soon.” 

“…but we are unable to refill all our reservoirs due to the current power outages. We hope to sort out this problem in two to three days when there is stable power supply,” he told Monitor. 

By Tuesday afternoon,the  water supply had not been restored.

Mr Nuwamanya  noted that the reservoirs help to balance the system network and reduce the cost of production.

“If we filled all the other reservoirs, water could easily  flow to our clients  homes by gravity but this is not the case,” he added.

NWSC supplies 230,000 cubic metres of water every month in Masaka and sells about 175,000 cubic metres with an average billing of Shs900m,according to Mr Nuwamanya .

“However, a total of  55,000 cubic metres are lost to leakages which take time to be fixed due to low man power,” he observed on December 13. 

The current water crisis   has raised a lot of concerns among city dwellers, mainly those whose businesses require high water supply. 

Mr Aron Mufumbira, an attendant at Lubega’s Washing Bay, in Kijjabwami said the water crisis has almost doubled their daily operational budget.

"We are buying water expensively -from vendors- which is eating into our profits ,” he remarked. 

Currently, a 20 -litre jerry can of water in Masaka City centre costs between Shs400 to Shs700 unlike in the past where a jerry can was costing Shs100. 

Some of the villages experiencing water shortages include Kimaanya, Bwala , Kumbu ,Soweto Zone ,Bata Cell ,Gayaza ,Katwe ,Kizungu  and  Mutuba Gardens  .

An engineer with NWSC who preferred anonymity to speak freely about the crisis said the current problem is partly exacerbated by dirty rain run-off water which poured into  Nabajjuzi swamp where they draw water from.

“The downpour experienced in the last couple of weeks  affected us as well .We therefore had to leave the water to concentrate   other than pumping dirty and contaminated water which could be dangerous to our customers,” he said on Tuesday. 

Residents now want NWSC to rescue the situation. 

 “We are spending much time looking for water and NWSC has not come out to explain what led to this crisis,” city resident Sulaiman Sebunya said. 

Currently, NWSC has 1, 2700 customers in the Masaka area which covers parts of Kalungu District. The NWSC customer base in Masaka is largely domestic at 83 percent, commercial at 12 percent, public standpipes at 2 percent while institutions stand at 3 percent.

*Additional reporting by Noeline Nabukenya