Why Zesa bills are so high
Do you know why bills from the Zimbabwe Electricity Supply Authority (ZESA) are so unrealistically high?
It is the salaries they pay themselves. ZESA's salaries system is so flawed and unrealistic in view of Zimbabwe's economic circumstances.
You will not believe how much an ordinary ZESA electrician takes home at the end of the month: On average an amount in excess of US$2 000 net salary!
ZESA's salaries system is deliberately open to abuse. Every ZESA employee has access to claim overtime. Human beings, by nature, clamour for more if the system is full of loopholes.
The ZESA system is so flawed that every technician gets away with overtime payments in excess of their normal salaries. It's a flurry of activity when it comes to filling in of overtime forms at ZESA. The system is so hopeless.
Some jobs at ZESA are deliberately not done during normal working time so as to simply take advantage of extra time. Most technicians prefer to work overtime and during weekends so as to overshoot their salaries.
Employees simply spend all day loafing around, pretending to be working.
Those who are supposed to supervise electricians also benefit and are not prepared to rein-in the overtime corruption racket. Supervisors also claim overtime under the guise of supervising every time an worker claims overtime. .
I challenge anyone to visit ZESA's salaries department and go through the salaries schedule to prove the above.
Salaries at ZESA are so unjustifiably and unrealistically high by Zimbabwean market standards, gobbling close to 70 percent of revenues with nothing left for any meaningful capital projects.
If only ZESA could take a leaf from ESKOM, which subcontracts most of its works, maintenance and even meter reading thereby ensuring work is paid for something really done; creating in turn, efficiency coupled with down-stream savings.
This would also leave them with free hands to manage the system effectively. But alas, ZESA is run on pre-independence traditional managerial styles. Had it not been for the monopoly it enjoys, ZESA would have long since folded. The whole organisation is treated like a fiefdom and dinosaur by those who manage it.
Visit any one of their workshops and see. People are literally not working throughout the day. Why do you think people get estimated bills?
So, next time you wonder why your bill is so high - it is the salaries for work not done, for overtime deliberately created and the longer you are off, the more the overtime and salaries.
It's high time the powers that be re-visited ZESA salaries, to curtail deliberate corruption in the name of overtime etc.
I propose all salaries be halved.
