Ingwebu franchise - Councillors on a collision course

BULAWAYO City Councillors and the Bulawayo Municipal Commercial Undertaking (BMCU) Ingwebu board are headed for a collision course after it emerged that councillors recently rejected a report on the organisation's franchise system.

The councillors further went on to exclude two beer gardens, MaDlodlo and MaKhumalo, from the list of those to be franchised against the board's directive.

The BMCU board was appointed to manage Ingwebu breweries and council farms on behalf of the local authority.

According to a council confidential report the board had submitted a report to council advising them that it was not financially beneficial for them to hold to the two beer gardens as they would still have to endure running costs and this impacting negatively on their profit making endeavour.

"While the board felt all liquor outlets had to be franchised, it would be wise for council not to franchise one or two of its outlets in order to retain the expertise of administering beer gardens.

"However, the retention of MaKhumalo would attract US$193 000 in running costs per year. If MaKhumalo was franchised there would be no running costs and Ingwebu would profit through franchise fees. If MaDlodlo was also to be retained the cost of running both outlets would be US$393 000," reads part of the minutes.

The move by the councillors to consider blocking franchising MaKhumalo (Big Bhawa) and MaDlodlo beer gardens, both in Makokoba, was triggered by a letter that was sent by the city's former mayor Mr Japhet Ndabeni Ncube in which he argued that they were of sentimental value.

"I am writing as a very concerned and true son of the City of Kings requesting Ingwebu and council to retain Big Bhawa in the hands of Ingwebu for sentimental reasons. It is appreciated that Ingwebu Breweries and council are offloading the beer outlets to private individuals on account of business ethos that call for profitability and all in view of poor returns to Ingwebu and council so far.

"The Bulawayo City Council and its company Ingwebu have done so much over the years by way of pleasing the people of Bulawayo and all by providing the lovely and tasty product' utshwala tshwala. Let council and Ingwebu retain that famous name by continuing to operate Big Bhawa," reads part of the letter sent by Mr Ncube.

MaKhumalo is the oldest beer hall in the city.

Last year the Ingwebu board had requested to franchise all beer outlets and council had passed a resolution in support of that request, with the main aim being for the brewery company to start posting profits therefore be able to start paying a dividend to the local authority.

During the ensuing debate councillors were of the view that the supplementary report by the board had shortcomings  which might have a bearing on their submissions.

The town clerk, Mr Middleton Nyoni, however, pointed out that council transferred authority to the Ingwebu board to make decisions, thus council could only persuade the board to view such matters in their favour and could not prescribe issues on them.

An impeccable council source further revealed that the board was now feeling overshadowed by the councillors as they had clearly stated that they did not need to hold onto the beer gardens as they still controlled these outlets despite them being franchised.

"The move by the councillors clearly shows that they do not trust the very board they appointed hence the board feels undermined. Besides the councillors are the ones who keep clamouring for a dividend," said the source.

Efforts to get a comment from the board chaiperson were, however, fruitless as his mobile phone was unreachable.

Ingwebu has been dogged by a number of problems which saw the closure of 16 of their beer gardens subsequently resulting in the Bulawayo City Council (BCC) dismissing three of its board members in the pretext of not renewing their contracts, the remaining three later resigned in solidarity with their dismissed colleagues.