Council must not hide behind a finger

The recent claim by Harare Mayor, Bernard Manyenyeni that Government ordered demolitions of houses at Arlington Estate which is close to Harare International Airport exonerating council involvement is nothing but just flimsy excuses from a person who is attempting to hide behind a finger, through the blame game.

According to a High Court judge, Justice Priscilla Chigumba, it is against the law for any Government department to destroy people's houses. Justice Chigumba mentioned that even though the structures may be illegal, due process must be followed.  In most countries in the world, shelter is a constitutional right which must be upheld and Zimbabwe is no different.

As quoted by Justice Chigumba, section 68 of the Constitution of Zimbabwe states that every person has a right to administrative conduct that is lawful. In that view, Harare City Council (HCC) should also shoulder the blame in those demolitions.

HCC cannot run away from an obvious fact that these demolitions have exposed how the local authorities have become dysfunctional in the country. Every organization or government department desires to be seen as good in the eyes of the public. This should be done without poking into one's nose. However, it will be saddening if Harare municipality refutes to be accountable for allocation of unlawful of stands which led to the destruction of people's houses. In simpler terms, HCC is trying to run away from the fact that it is a failed institute, thus nonsensically putting its burden of failures on the ruling government.

From previous incidents, Council has proved that it has failed dismally. In the first place, HCC was not supposed to go to Nyikavanhu Housing Co-operative and demolish houses without any relevant documents from the High Court authorising them to act like wise.

Also, HCC should have identified that members of Nyikavanhu co-operative were illegally settling well before President Mugabe question about the existence of their unlawful structures. Shamefully, Harare municipality is just trying to distance itself from issues that every Dick and Tom knows quite well that they had a hand in them.   

It is well known that most of the housing cooperatives whose illegal houses were destroyed were built on the basis of political patronage, especially from MDC-T activists who used influential positions in councils to embark on their own version of distribution of housing stands. MDC-T councillors should not hide behind a skewed definition of politics in order to fulfill their agendas.

For instance, Harare City Council caused and undertook the demolitions of 200 houses that were illegally erected in Budiriro along Highglen-Kambuzuma road. This alone, depicts that there is lack of liability in this local municipality.

What surprises most people is that the victims of those illegal settlements were paying monthly rates to the same council which is now refuting to be associated with the land scandals. If council was aware that those people were unlawfully settling, how come it was accepting monthly rates?

However, there are a number of weaknesses on service delivery that HCC is also paying no attention to.

Besides demolitions and allocation of illegal land to desperate home seekers, HCC has a lot to do, in order to improve service delivery for Harare residents.

Firstly, HCC should ensure that all piled filthy refuse mostly in high density suburbs is collected. For example, in Glenview at Tichagarika shopping center, there is a mountain of piled refuse which is accumulating by each day. Such piled refuse are a healthy hazard as they contribute immensely in causing major diseases like typhoid. As we speak, there are a number of report cases on typhoid in Harare especially in high density areas.

Apart from refuse collection, council has a major role to play in ensuring that roads in urban cities are rehabilitated. Apparently, most of these roads are in a bad condition that most motorists are taking the risk by purchasing new sets of tyres after every four to five months. From the look of things, it seems Harare city council has equally failed or is ignoring to maintain those roads so that they can blame the ruling government as well.

Truth be told, most areas in towns are either receiving dirty tape water or their tapes are totally dry. It's actually a crime not to offer the required services to rate payers who are struggling to pay their water bills. It's like day light robbery of ratepayers' money. With the level of corruption being reported in most local authorities, people are made to believe that their funds are being channeled towards enriching council bosses. Something must give, Harare residents have been suffering in silence with "illiterate" MDC councilors running down our sunshine city.