Water for People defends borehole use

Water for People, an international organisation, has said boreholes remain the only viable source of water in most African countries.

Regional manager for Water for People—Africa, Gordon Mundo, said this yesterday in Blantyre during the opening of a day-long meeting aimed at reviewing how the organisation has performed during the ending year.

Reacting to views from some quarters, including parliamentarians, who have been urging government to adopt piped water system and abandon planting boreholes, Mundo said the majority of the population in the continent live in rural areas; hence, groundwater is sustainable for them.

“Piped water is expensive because it needs to be treated and if you measure how much it costs to treat piped water compared to sustaining a borehole, the latter is the cheapest. So we cannot rule out boreholes at the moment,” he said.

Mumbo, however, said boreholes have proved to be a failure because the users want to use them for free.

Kate Harawa, Water for People—Malawi country director, said Malawi has achieved above 80 percent access to water, but appealed for support from non-governmental organisations and government for the remaining population to be reached with safe water.

The meeting has attracted representatives from Blantyre, Chikwawa and Rumphi where Water for People is running Wash (water, sanitation and hygiene) programmes.