Harare Council Probe: Net Closes in on Corrupt Officials
THE Harare City Council has ordered investigations into the way several
projects and outsourced jobs were handled in a move that could unearth
massive corrupt activities dating back to the time the municipality was run
by commissions appointed by the government. Council also plans to
restructure some departments it considers contributed to the suspected
corrupt activities.
The new administration has been under unrelenting pressure from the Combined
Harare Residents’ Association (CHRA) to investigate several reports of
mounting corruption, which they believe was perpetuated by the illegal
commissions appointed by the Minister of Local Government, Urban and Rural
Development, Ignatious Chombo.
According to reports from various committees tabled at the ordinary council
meeting on Tuesday, one of the biggest projects councillors want
investigated is the recent purchase of sewer main pipes valued at US$1.6
million from a local company, Hume Pipe by the Department of Water and
Sanitation.
Council’s Environmental Management Committee submitted that there was an
anomaly in the way the contract to excavate the trenches for sewer pipes was
awarded.
The committee also said there was no proof that a telecommunications
company, Econet was authorised to dig trenches in the city, or that the
company had made any payments to council.
The council called for an investigation into these activities, including the
digging of trenches from Boka Tobacco Auction Floors to Glen Norah by an
unnamed businessman.
It has also been recommended that council restructures the Department of
Urban Planning Services by relocating the City Valuation and Estates
Management Division (CVEM) to the Finance Department following the
“suspected corrupt awarding of billboard advertising contracts”.
Among others, council said that some companies were erecting billboards in
areas already allocated to other advertising companies on major roads and
that conditions regulating the erection of such billboards were not being
followed.
During the discussion, it also emerged that there were people currently
going around claiming that council was working towards setting up a new
Mupedzanhamo Flea Market following recent clashes over the allocation of
stalls.
“I am not sure where this talk about the construction of a second phase of
Mupedzanhamo is coming from. They are collecting people’s monies,” Mbare
councillor, Friday Muleya said.
Deputy mayor Emmanuel Chiroto said the “conmen” who might have links with
council employees had gone as far as Hatcliffe, collecting money from
desperate vendors.
The conmen claim the money will be used for the construction of the flea
market.
Mayor Muchadeyi Masunda said “residents of Harare need to be told the truth,
that there is no such development”.
Councillors have also queried the way some companies were given space to
erect billboards and how contracts for the purchase of sewer pipes and
excavation of trenches were awarded.
But councillors said the most embarrassing anomaly was the way the
municipality lost a case against one of its employees after an outside
lawyer was hired to represent it.
The municipality was forced to reinstate the employee from its emergency
services division within two weeks.
“During discussion, the (Human Resources and General Purposes) Committee
noted that an external legal practitioner had represented council in this
case without its approval,” read the minutes.
The committee said what was more disheartening was the fact that its
recommendation to have the matter resolved internally was disregarded.
The chamber secretary, Josephine Ncube has since been asked to explain why
the lawyer was hired without the committee’s approval.
In addition, the committee recommended that the Chamber Secretary’s
department be reduced by creating a stand alone legal division.
CHRA has called for an “urgent inquiry by an independent commission set up
by councillors into the issue of the leaking of funds and that professional
and independent auditors be engaged to conduct an audit into the operations
and accounts of the city’s finance department.”
The association also wants “proper systems and procedures to be put in place
to govern the use and disbursement of money within the city treasury to
ensure transparency and accountability.”
Several council undertakings of late have raised eyebrows and they include
the disappearance of meat meant for guests at Masunda’s installation several
months ago and theft of cattle at council farms.
In October, councillors tried to stop the construction of the Joshua Nkomo
Expressway that will link the Harare International Airport and the city
centre after they raised objections on the way tenders for the project were
handled.
They argued that while Harare was going to spend more than US$80 million on
a distance of less than 20 km a project stretching 77 km in Chegutu had cost
US$19 million. But Chombo ordered the councillors to rescind their decision
to stop all projects related to the Airport Road construction deal.
BY JENNIFER DUBE
Posted by Wellington Chadehumbe
on December 6, 2009. Filed under Local News.
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