Govt blocks Harare City Council from recruiting more workers

Harare (New Ziana)-Following the public outcry over the flooding that is taking place in many parts of the city, the Harare Municipality wants to recruit additional workers to clear drains when its payroll is already bloated.

The high wage bill has made it impossible for council to adequately maintain infrastructure, resulting in the spread of preventable diseases caused by poor sanitation and mismanagement of waste.

In line with government policy on costs and expenditure ratio for local authorities, acting Local Government and Public Works Minister Kirsty Coventry dismissed the application by the local authority to employ thousands of casual workers to rescue its battered image.

The government issued Circular No 4 of 2013, which provides that employee costs should not exceed 30 percent of total expenditure, as 70 percent should be channelled towards service delivery.

In a statement on Monday, chairperson of the Environmental Management Committee Kudzai Kadzombe castigated the government for denying council the permission to employ drain cleaners.

“Council is currently carrying out drain cleaning, catch pits cleaning, grass cutting, pipe drain de-blocking and spoil removal exercise City wide,” she said, adding shortage of manpower had hampered their efforts.

“Council has already engaged the parent Ministry of Local Government and Public Works seeking approval to employ drain cleaners, grass cutters and street cleaners as per the Ministerial directive which is against the spirit of devolution.

“The Ministry requested justification for the need for those specific workers, despite providing the justification to the Ministry is still to respond. After frequent follow ups with the Ministry, we have been advised that Minister July Moyo is on Leave and the Acting Minister Kirsty Coventry refused to approve.”

Kadzombe said once City Council was cleared to recruit, it would expedite the process.

She despite the refusal, the City Council was not resting on its laurels as drain clearance was a recurrent routine exercise which it carried out throughout the year.

“Primarily because of the behaviour of the general citizenry and vendors who have a tendency of using catch pits as litter pits,” she said, adding vendors also stored their wares in catch pits.

“This results in blockages of catch pits and pipes leading to flooding. Progress on this is not noticeable as rubbish is swept into catch pits and storm water drains daily.”

Kadzomba said the Amenities division was currently working day and night to control litter while the Roads division had established a designated gang responsible for drain cleaning and flood management to man the Central Business District throughout the rainy season.

The two departments were also carrying out a joint drain cleaning, drain clearing and spoil removal operation to complement the main program to clear illegal dumpsites in the CBD, she said.

“The illegal dumps lead to flooding after the waste from the dumps is washed into storm water drains,” she said, adding there would be heavy enforcement and littering control in the city.

At most street corners in city there are vendors roasting green mealies and leaving the mealie covers thrown all over, and eventually find their way into the drainage system.

Kadzombe said most of the steel catch pits covers, half drum metal bins which were installed by City Parking were all stolen and sold as scrap in Magaba in Mbare and Gazaland in Highfield and as a solution, the local authority was now installing plastic bins to prevent thefts.

She some new construction/developments, invasion of wetlands and unauthorised trenching done at night was also interfering with the underground storm water drainage where at times drainage is completely cut and blocked.

New Ziana