BY EDMUND SMITH-ASANTE
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| SODECI's Djibi water treatment facility |
The Ivorian government as at 2010 owed the country’s
water company, SODECI (La Societe de Distribution d'eau de Cote d'Ivoire), CFA
40 billion (US$79,207,804.60) in unpaid water
bills alone.
This amount comprised unpaid bills from schools,
hospitals and government establishments over many years.
But although the Ivorian government has since that
year began paying up the debt it owes the privately owned utility company,
there still remains a huge chunk of the money to be paid.
Revealing this at a training workshop on “Water
financing and preservation of the resource in West Africa” for about 30 West
African journalists in Abidjan from July 1, 2013 to July 5, 2013, Mr. Seydou
Dembele, Head, Government Expenses, Water Resources Department, Cote d’Ivoire,
said “Government has now paid a big part of the money and it remains now CFA 24
billion [US$ 47,512,183.55].”
The Ivorian government official however added that
some of the huge debts have been incurred as a result of wastage and illegal
connections.
Speaking on the topic “Funding mechanisms of water:
the different scenarios”, Mr. Dembele disclosed that as a result of illegal
connections, about CFA 3 billion is lost to the state annually, while 100 km of
pipes are destroyed.
He lamented that when people are arrested for doing
illegal connections they are not prosecuted but just left to go because there
are no laws to punish them. For the illegal connections that people make there
are no metres, hence the inability of the service providers to determine the
volume of water used and bill them, he said.
In an interview after the workshop organised by
Global Water Partnership, West Africa (GWP-WA and the International Union of
Conservation (IUCN) on July 2, 2013, he divulged that in order to stop the
stockpiling of the debt again, government has begun paying CFA 600 million as
its water bill every month to the utility company.
Touching on the population without access to water,
he said the country is currently experiencing a 30% deficit.
Mr. Dembele said to deal with the deficit;
government has received funding from the Islamic Development Bank, Arabic
Development Bank and World Bank, but all that is not enough to meet the needs
of Abidjan residents, adding that CFA 48 billion is needed to supply everyone
in just the capital with water.
Speaking on the investments made by government in
the water sector, he said all pumps are bought by the state, while the various
communities making up the population pay 10% of the cost of producing potable
water.
In spite of the debt owed by government to the water
company, Mr. Francois Olivier Gosso, Director of Production, SODECI, indicated
during a tour of the company’s Djibi water plant that they have never
experienced any stoppage in production.
Adding to this, the agreement with government is
that the state takes charge of investment in the company, while the company
takes care of water supply to the nation.
Whereas in 2008 water coverage in Cote d’Ivoire was
61%, it is currently at 66% and the MDG target it hopes to achieve by 2015 for
its estimated population of 20 million, is 82.5%.
SODECI has provided over 30 years of service in
water supply to Cote d’Ivoire’s urban community, starting with a lease contract
which lasted for approximately 25 years. This was converted into a concession
in 1987. The World Bank and other international financial establishments have also
been working in partnership with the water agency through financing of
investments in water supply.
Cote d’Ivoire’s rural population is served by ONEP
(the National Office of Drinking Water) a state owned institution which is also
in charge of investments in the water sector, although SODECI was in charge of
water pumps before 1987.
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