Lack of capacitation, orientation and training on local governance issues is a stumbling block to effective service delivery by local councils as this has incapacitated local council authorities. Local councils have come under fire for failing to deliver and coming up with sound and quality service delivery capacity. In Kwekwe, which has been accused of housing the worst crop of councillors in history of the local authority, councillors are allegedly struggling to interpret local governance issues and budget formulation processes and relying on council management to explain local governance issues to councillors.
“There is need for a minimum qualification for one to be elected as councillor, but what is lacking is training or capacitation on issues to do with local governance, we need to have a lot of training, not more than two or three workshops were done since 2018 when we got into office, you cannot expect miracles from councillors. Most of councillors are young people with diplomas and degrees as educational and professional qualifications” said Josiah Makombe President of Urban Councils Association of Zimbabwe (Ucaz) during Kwekwe Press Club online briefing with journalists. He said they are at the mercy of Ministry of Local Government who can train them at their own time and call.
Gokwe Town Coucil has also been riddled with all forms of corruption , mismanagement and misappropriation of funds by both Councillors and management. This has been attributed to inappropriate educational and professional background which is not suitable for local governance issues. Redcliff municipality has also come under heavy verbal artillery from all sectors as most councilors have educational and professional deficiency and local governance hemorrhage and lack accountability.
Gweru City Council recently gobbled up $3.5 million on a three day workshop held at Chevron Hotel in Masvingo, each delegate pocketing a cool $65m, despite the government banning all workshops due to Covid 19 pandemic.
“ Gweru City Council could have at least advised workshop facilitators to hold the wotkshop in Gweru,maybe in council Boardroom as this has revealed council inability to prioritize on matters exposing council’s lack of educational and professional background, which affects execution of decisions on matters that require astute judgemental capacity and intellectual capacity”, said a Civic leader in Kwekwe.
