Chamisa's councillors probed for selling Bulawayo to Harare

BULAWAYO City Council (BCC) has instituted investigations into allegations that four councillors were recently funded by a Harare-based company to allegedly influence its tendering process.

According to the latest council report, the council's chief auditor-general is already seized with the matter.

"The chief internal auditor was currently seized with the issue of the four councillors who were allegedly funded by a parking management company to visit Harare. …. it would be proper to await the Chief Internal Auditor's report before any implementation of the said resolution," reads the report in part.

The issue of the four councillors - who were not named - arose during discussion of the parking management company's tendering process in the city. Councillor Earnest Rafomoyo pointed out that the second resolution which was to give parking management to two companies (Ducretion Logistics (Private) Ltd and Lauvax (Private) Ltd/ A Pro Park) was a joint venture regulated through the Joint Venture Act.

He noted that council had made the resolution with the view that the joint venture was a partnership that was going to benefit the city.

"He therefore suggested that in order to implement parking management system timeously, council in the meantime should continue with the joint venture and do away with the tendering process as it would be time consuming," reads the report.

Other councillors also supported the idea saying council's previous decision of awarding the two companies should be implemented to avoid yet another legal battle. The council recently won a case against a parking management company, Megalithic (Private) Ltd which had taken the local authority to court citing a breach of contract after it had initially been awarded the tender.

Commenting on the issue, Chamber secretary Sikhangele Zhou said council had put the horse before the cart in accepting the proposal from the two companies without doing preliminary steps that were a requirement for the establishment of a joint venture.

"She advised that unsolicited bids had to meet the criteria outlined in the Joint Venture Act and some of the preliminary steps would analyse the concept note and after appraisal this be submitted to the Joint Venture Unit in the ministry of Finance which would in turn seek approval for a feasibility study wherein if approved the feasibility study will be done by a consultant chosen by the contracting authority (Council) at the expense of the proposer."

She added: "The results of the feasibility study and negotiations could be finalised to lead to a decision to allocate companies space to operate from."