National Water and Sewerage Corporation (NWSC) has restored water supply to several government agencies that had been cut off the grid since last week.
NWSC has given the Uganda Police Force, the Uganda People’s Defence Forces (UPDF) and Mulago National Referral Hospital up to a month to clear their outstanding water bills. Prisons and Mulago hospital each owe NWSC Shs 5 billion while Police owes the water supply body another Shs 6 billion. UPDF has an outstanding debt of Shs 10 billion.
Water supply to these agencies was cut off on Friday last week following repeated but unheeded reminders to clear outstanding bills.
Uganda Prisons spokesperson Frank Baine explained that the institution struggles to pay its water bill on time because of budgetary deficits. Baine says that prisons requests from government Shs 6.2 billion per year to meet its water bill but government only releases Shs 1.2 billion.
He refutes the claim that money to pay the water bill is always diverted. NWSC spokesperson Sam Apedel stated that the decision to reconnect the affected government agencies arose from a communication from the ministry of finance on Wednesday that committed to paying the outstanding bills for the cut off agencies.
The institutions have been given one month credit subject to a further disconnection in case they do not comply. However Baine says although negotiations are still on-going, their hands are tied since this year’s budget might be slimmer following a directive by President Yoweri Museveni.
“President Museveni has directed a further 10% decrease on the budget across all the ministries which will again affect us further. This is because the number of prisoners keeps on increasing so we cannot say we are reducing the quantity of food we cook,” he says.
Uganda Prisons has 51,800 prisoners depending on the water from NWSC. Prisoners had been forced to forego some activities like bathing since the disconnection last week. Many prisoners reportedly refused to work in the fields, stating that they would get dirty and have no water to shower with.
The prison was using water tanks to supply to the three prisons of Murchison Bay, Upper Prison and Remand.
Irene Ayaa says, “For those who have water tanks in their homes, they were all dry, while those who only fetch in jerrycans and don’t store suffered the most, they had to carry water from long distances.”