People in Dowa have faulted the Central Region Water Board (CRWB) for failing to resolve water challenges which have been there since 2009.
According to the residents, they usually receive intermittent or no water supply at all.
Meanwhile, the board has again re-assured its customers surrounding Dowa boma that normal water supply will resume towards the end of this month of February.
Responding to the accusations during a District Executive Committee meeting held at the boma, the Board’s Dowa scheme manager, Anuel Mkandawire, said the CRWB is doing all it can to end the water challenge at the boma.
Mkandawire said the Board has drilled three boreholes at Malata location and equipped them as supplementary to the already existing boreholes around the boma.
He said new water pipes have been connected from the main pumping station located at the Dowa Hills and the situation will normalise after ESCOM fully connect its power lines.
Dowa boma has for several years been on and off in water supply forcing residents to move up and down fetching water in nearby locations boreholes.
At one time, some angry customers showed council officials piped water mixed with mud forcing the Board’s officers to travel from Lilongwe to Dowa boma to assess the problem where they attributed it to old leaked pipes.
Even though an assurance was made carrying a message of hope for improving the situation, the residents have up to this date seen no change making them to live with empty buckets of water with some fetching water in unprotected wells.
In one of the previous District Executive Committee meetings, members asked the council if it can give them a go ahead to meet the Board’s officers in Lilongwe to hear for themselves what the Board is doing to rectify the challenge.
They also wanted the council to allow those who can afford to drill boreholes in their houses.
But, the council’s Water Development Officer, Timothy Banda said according to the water policy, drilling boreholes is prohibited in the urban and semiurban centres, and this applies to Dowa boma and Mponela trading centre.
