KRRA hits out at council
Kwekwe Residents and Ratepayers Association (KRRA) has lashed out at Kwekwe City Council management and councillors for being insensitive to residents and ratepayers plight, as the council is no longer concerned about service delivery issues.
The association accused the council of sidelining ratepayers during its recent 2018 Ward Budget Consultative Meetings held from 30 August to 6 October this year.
KRRA Secretary General Alex Homela deplored the way the council is handling its affairs and urged the council to consult ratepayers and other stakeholders when issues affecting residents of the city.
“The 2018 Ward Budget Consultative Meetings were done in a haphazard manner, the dates and times of the meetings were not convenient to most residents as they were not advertised in the local newspapers, we were not consulted on the meetings as most residents did not have ample time to look into the budget at the meetings. Most of these meetings were poorly attended, with 7 to 10 residents attending each meeting. Chana Primary School had the highest number of residents in attendance, followed by Kwekwe Theatre with 17 people. This shows how badly the meetings were made public,” said Homela.
KRRA has disassociated itself from the council budget and has no input into the budget and accused the council of arm twisting councillors into submission.
“We are not part and parcel of the budget, we are going to consult the incoming Minister of Local government, Public Works and National Housing on the budget and other issues in council. We need to know what happened to ZINARA money which was allocated to the council, council beer outlets were sublet to individuals, the abattoir is said to have been sold or tendered to someone else, we don’t know how the council expects to get revenue as they have tendered all income generating projects to individuals who are now making profit out of the supposedly loss making council entities,” said Homela.
On the same note, Homela raised major residents’ concerns as lack of consultation by the City of Kwekwe as most of the time residents are starved of the information about the budget.
He said there is need to revamp the dilapidated water infrastructure noting that the housing backlog is ever increasing as council lacked commitment to embark on housing projects in earnest.
Another concern, he said, is tender irregularities which lack transparency and accountability in the local authority’s tendering processes.
The city of Kwekwe is the only city which does not work with the ratepayers associations as they are deemed political, but there is need to work with such associations to foster good faith and accountability in improving service delivery by local government departments.
