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DIRTY WATER FLOWING FROM TAPS

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MBABANE – Since last December, dirt from a property under development at Ezulwini has been a nightmare for some businesses in the thriving town.


The two affected businesses are Lidwala Backpacker’s Lodge d Woodlands Restaurant.
It could not be confirmed what the source of the contamination was but affected residents think it is because of a certain property being developed at the foot of Sheba’s Breast Mountain.
It is allegedly positioned in such a way that after rains, sand is washed downhill and contaminates water supply to the two places.


The self-catering lodge uses a borehole system as its sole source of water.
It has 10 rooms and the borehole system feeds water to the communal kitchen, showers, laundry room, and toilets. After rains, the silt is said to flow all the way to the MR103 Road.
Brownish water flows out of the taps the moment you open them. A local citizen who once spent a night at the lodge said the water in the showers also appeared to contain sand.
She said the water would reach ankle level at times during showers. She said the water was sandy.


Lidwala Manager Phumi Mamba narrated how the sand from the property had cost them a lot of money.
Mamba said they bought several five-litre containers of water per day for their clients to have drinking water. He said they had addressed the matter with the Swaziland Environmental Authority (SEA) and the owner of the property.
Mamba was asked how safe the water was to their customers, to which responded, “We took a sample to be tested by the Swaziland Water Service Corporation (SWSC) and the results were that the water was clean,” he said.
Mamba confirmed that their water was contaminated by sand from the ongoing construction up the mountain.


He said when the rains started last year; the sand the contractors had dug was washed into the stream that flowed into their sole supply of water. He said they engaged SEA to divert the contaminated stream so that it did not flow into their borehole system.
Mamba said the SEA made attempts to divert the stream but the silt continued to be washed into their system. He said at the moment, all they could do was sit back and let the whole system flush underground. He said the contamination was no longer as bad as it was when the problem started.
                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                       

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