Water delivery is being constrained by procurement gaps

Jan 09, 2026 Letters

Dear Editor,

A review of publicly available procurement notices and project timelines in the water sector suggests that the delivery of water to households is likely to continue lagging behind official announcements. While there are active Invitations for Bids for major works such as water treatment plants, there is limited public evidence of concluded awards, quantities, or delivery schedules for consumption-critical items such as water meters, meter boxes, and small-diameter service pipes.

This matters because these items are the practical gating factor for household connections. Treatment capacity expansion, while necessary, does not by itself put water into homes. Without confirmed contracts and visible mobilization for meters and service lines, new housing schemes and regularization areas remain functionally unserved, even where land has been allocated or trunk infrastructure is in place.

Based on what is currently available in the public domain, procurement in the water sector does not appear to be tightly sequenced with housing rollouts. The absence of clear award notices and region-by-region delivery plans for connection materials makes it difficult to see how large numbers of new households will be connected in the near term. This leads to a reasonable conclusion: water delivery at the household level will continue to advance slowly, regardless of headline infrastructure projects.

For residents, the impact is immediate and measurable, continued reliance on trucked or purchased water, delayed occupation of house lots, and higher household costs. These outcomes point to a governance issue, not a technical one. The question is whether procurement planning is being aligned to service delivery rather than to project announcements.

Greater transparency on awarded contracts, quantities, and mobilization timelines for household-level connection materials would allow both Parliament and the public to assess whether water access is being delivered in a timely and cost-effective manner.

Yours faithfully,
Sherod Duncan, M.P

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