THE Department of Registry has expressed concerns that they are failing to fully service the
whole province due to the non-availability of substations.
Matabeleland South Provincial Registrar, Muringa told her employer, the Public Service
Commission about the serious challenges they are having in their operations during a recent visit
by PSC.
“As the Registry, we are failing to fully service our clients because instead of having 22 sub-
stations we don’t have even one.
“Wherever we are operating from, we operate in the hand of mercy.
“It’s either we are operating from a Lutheran Church or at a small room or even at a disused
school storeroom.
“In Plumtree, we have two districts sharing one office. These are Bulilima and Mangwe who are
squeezed in one tiny office.
“We are an office that does not discard documents, they run forever, for example, a 1904 birth
record must be kept in our files because they don’t go to national archives,” explained the
provincial registrar.
She went on to appeal for the construction of district offices.
“We hope devolution funds will be fairly distributed and be channeled towards construction of
district registry offices.
“In the spirit of devolution, services must go to the needy people. I have people coming from as
far as Makhulela in Plumtree, who are compelled to travel more than 300km to Gwanda one way
only for a birth record or other documents.
“Currently, Gwanda is not issuing passports so they are then referred to Beitbridge which is an
additional 200km which gives them a total of 1000 km back home,” explained Muringa.
Responding to the registrar’s concern, PSC vice-chairperson, Dr. Nothando Ndiweni, said the
electronic system might come handy in solving their challenges.
“In as much as the Department of Registry might be facing office space challenges and human
resources, the electronic systems will lessen their burden.
“Instead of keeping loads and loads of files they must just capture their records in computers
which will be faster and easy to access.

“Covid-19 taught us that you don’t need to be always in office in order to do your work but can
work from anywhere.
“This is a positive development we can all tap into and execute work effectively,” responded Dr.
Ndiweni.
Most of the youths from Matabeleland South, who end up crossing borders to either South Africa
or Botswana would have failed to acquire these documents and as a result they are not employed.