For almost two decades after Zimbabwe’s independence in 1980, Harare’s water and sanitation infrastructure ran relatively smoothly. In 1988, the World Health Organization (WHO) and the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) reported that over 84 percent of Zimbabweans had access to safe drinking water.[1] By the mid-1990s, a combination of drought, a ballooning population and increasing neglect of infrastructure began to impact urban areas, and water shortages in the high-density suburbs became more frequent. Water quality also became a problem as public sector corruption and mismanagement led to the neglect of infrastructure.