08 Feb 2024

Parliament has been told that Water Utilities Corporation (WUC) is working towards rolling out smart water meters across the country with effect from May.

Contributing to the debate on the 2024/2025 budget proposals, Minister of Lands and Water Affairs, Dr Kefentse Mzwinila said the tender for smart meter installation was already floating and due to close in March.

Dr Mzwinila said there were currently more than 500 000 conventional meters countrywide that have to be replaced within a four year period.

 He indicated that one of the key components on rolling out the advanced technology for water metering was the aspect of prepayment services which would address rising concerns of WUC wavering billing system.

He highlighted that the smart meters would enable automatic and remote reading of customer meters thus improving the efficiency and accuracy of customer billing.

“Water Utilities Corporation is not outrightly going for prepaid meters, but rather smart meters, which will have a capacity of both prepayment and post payment,” he explained.

Dr Mzwinila said he anticipated the nation to warmly receive the smart metering as it has been long overdue.

He indicated that the smart water meters were first installed as a pilot project at Nanogang Junior Secondary School while another batch of 1 000 meters were installed at the Village suburb in Gaborone.

Dr Mzwinila stated that WUC would also in near future embark on new technology on ground  water treatment to improve the quality of ground  water in constituencies that  heavily  rely  on ground  water  particularly  in the Kgalagadi and Shoshong  regions.

“Plans are at an advanced stake to move from the old fashioned reverse osmosis and move to a new type of water treatment technology known as ion exchange,” he explained.

He disclosed that piloting of the ion exchange  technology would initially be done in some  of the most  saline boreholes in three constituencies of Kgalagadi South, Shoshong and  the  North West, adding that  the process was expected to start would be rolled  out in April, pending the Parliament’s  approval  of the  2024/2025  budget proposals.

 With regard to plot allocations, Dr Mzwinila indicated that the Ministry was at 70 percent of the set target of 100 000 plots. He said due to difficulties encountered in doing the project internally, the ministry had to partner with BITRI for the use of new technology.

 “We have so far allocated 70 000 plots and each plot directly affects three individuals, as a result a total of 210 000 individuals have been directly impacted by the said allocations,” he said.

Dr  Mzwinila raised a concern over the alarming rate  of  plot  transfers indicating that  a lot  of plot ownership  transfer was  done within the  first  week of allocations.

In his contribution to the debate, Ngami MP, Mr Caterpillar Hikuama dismissed the 2024/2025 budget proposals, saying it did not reflect the progress made from the previous financial year.

 Mr Hikuama noted that there were projects that have long been budgeted for in the previous budgets but were yet to be implemented, citing the Mohembo-Sehitwa road as an example.

He stated that poor implementation of government programmes and projects continued to be a challenge, with projects experiencing cost overruns and delayed completion that resulted in over-expenditure.

 He said government should commit to strengthening project management, monitoring and evaluation structures.

Mr Hikuama also pleaded with government officials to guard against institutionalised corruption particularly during tendering process, cautioning that corruption linked to awarding of tenders continued to milk government coffers. ENDS