The Gobabis municipality has commenced the transition from conventional meters for both water and electricity to pre-paid meters.

This exercise is done to help it meet the municipality's financial obligations with bulk service providers such as NamPower and NamWater.

Gobabis Mayor Elwin Gariseb said the project will eventually see the entire town converted from conventional metering to pre-paid systems.

He said the municipality has started rolling out projects aimed at improving service delivery in the town. 

"Currently, we have rolled out the project for prepaid water as well as prepaid electricity in our town. The municipality has already begun installing water meters in the last two weeks. The community must understand that Gobabis will undergo a complete transformation from conventional to prepaid."

He reassured the residents about concerns surrounding the rollout of new prepaid meters. 

"The residents should know that these metres are installed at zero cost; there is no resident who will pay for the pre-paid metres; it will be free of charge to all residents who are formerly on the municipal system."

Gariseb said the shift to prepaid services is aimed at improving the municipality's financial position and helping the council meet its commitments to NamWater and NamPower. 

He added that a stronger cash flow will also place the town in a better position for any future conversion to a full prepaid supply system.

"NamWater and NamPower are negotiating with the council to put us on a prepaid system as a town. We asked before they put us on prepaid as a town, that we be allowed to first put our customers on prepaid so that we can have the cash flow that we need to have in our balances for us to be able to purchase when the town is moved from conventional to prepaid."

He also noted that attention will soon shift to the long-awaited development of the Kanaan C informal settlement after the current service delivery project is completed.

"We are upgrading the Kanaan C informal settlement. We have now elected committees that will be involved in this development because we want it to be a participatory process for community members to own. Committees are already elected; we are waiting on our partners to give us a specific date. We are going to train the community members on the upgrading of Kanaan C."