NWSC SERVICE DELIVERY DURING THE COVID PANDEMIC

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National Water and Sewerage Corporation (NWSC) is a Government Parastatal whose mandate is to provide water and sewerage services in urban towns entrusted to it by the Government, on a commercial and financially viable basis.
The Corporation’s strategic focus is to ensure water for all Ugandans, through accelerated sustainable growth and service reliability. This is in line with the overarching Government Policy of universal coverage as enshrined in the Vision 2040.

NWSC has experienced exponential growth in its geographical coverage over the last seven years increasing the towns of operation from 23 towns in 2013 to 258 towns to date. However, the nations’ growing population and urbanization continues to stretch the corporations supply infrastructure and as such several capital development projects are ongoing to solve the water supply problem in the medium and long term. Following the outbreak of the Corona virus in Uganda in March 2020, social distancing, wearing of face masks and hand washing have come out as the most effective ways through which individuals can avoid contracting and spreading the virus. As such, adequate access to clean water and hand washing points became an immediate necessity especially for communities leaving in low income areas. NWSC like many other corporate organizations came out strongly and took on several initiatives to ensure reliable and adequate supply of water to promote handwashing as one of several precautions in the fight against covid-19. Some of the initiatives undertaken by NWSC included; Following the onset of the COVID-19 outbreak, NWSC stayed committed to ensuring continuous and adequate water supply throughout the country, and as a result the corporation discontinued the disconnection of supply to customers for non-payment of water bills. While this gravely affected the corporations’ revenue for the year 2020, the overall objective was to ensure continued supply of clean water at all customer premises. meeting.

NWSC partnered with other corporate companies such as MTN Uganda and Roofings Uganda Ltd to install a total of 100 bulk water points aimed at supplying water to water stressed areas of Kampala. The areas that benefited from the water points included those areas at the periphery of the water supply network which currently receive intermittent supply or no water at all. Each of the 100 water points was installed with a 10,000 liter capacity water tank that supplies water at the official NWSC public tap tariff of UGx 25shs per 20 liter jerry can.

Whereas NWSC is currently able to produce 240 million liters of water per day within the Kampala Water service area, peak demand is at 300 million liters per day. To bridge this shortfall, NWSC is currently undertaking the construction of a 240 million liter per day capacity water treatment plant in Katosi to the East of Kampala. The first phase to be completed in March 2021 will deliver 160 million liters of water per day to the greater Kampala supply network. The areas that benefited from these water points included; Kyengera (Nagalabi-Kisozi), Wakiso-Kikoro, Mukono-Kasenge, Seeta (Kagala-Bukelele), Kyaliwajjala, Kijabijo, Kiteezi, Kiryagonja (Bulindo-Kira-Nsasa-Kilyamuli), Matugga-Buwuzume, Bulenga-Ganda-Bulenga, Kyebando Central, Gayaza, Nateete, Upper Nalumunye, Nansana, Kireka-Kamuli, Wakiso-Ssenge, Nansana-Gganda, Namagoma, Mukono-Nakapinyi, Ndejje-Ggangu, Najjanankumbi-Kitiko among others. NWSC also partnered with the Kampala Capital City Authority and installed hand washing points within the highly populated areas of the city. These included; food markets, shopping malls and taxi parks. In line with the Government strategic aspiration of achieving universal access to water supply, the NWSC over time has rolled out a number of performance improvement programmes aimed at improving service delivery and enhancing service coverage. These include among others;

Water Supply Stabilization Plans (WSSP): This entails downstream and upstream quick win investments in water production and supply infrastructure to improve water supply reliability and augment service delivery. The key interventions implemented include;
1. Construction of water reservoirs, booster stations and other mini projects to augment water production and supply
2. Rehabilitation and construction of distribution and transmission mains.
3. Development of alternative water sources especially production wells.
4. Intensification of the existing secondary and tertiary water networks.

Implementation of Environmental Protection activities: Environmental protection is crucial to the sustainability of the Corporation’s business given the impact it poses on water sources. The corporation over the years has been active in tree planting across its areas of operation and ensuring use of live fencing around the water sources Following the above interventions, the Rotary club of Nsangi has recognized Dr. Silver Mugisha Managing Director of NWSC with the 2020-2021 vocational award for his tremendous contribution to the water and sanitation sector. While receiving the award, the Managing Director thanked the Rotary Club of Nsangi for the kind gesture which he said is motivation towards the corporations efforts in ensuring 100% service coverage. The corporation remains committed to ensuring effective service delivery as the country and the world at large seeks a permanent solution to managing the spread of the Corona Virus

Written By Sheba Bamwine, NWSC