The Harare City Council is not relenting in its quest to force residents to pay for outstanding rates, refuse and water charges.
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The authority has sent out letters of demand to thousands of residents in the past five months and has also unleashed debt collectors on people with little means of income.
Recent reports also suggest the city has now started attaching property from defaulters ranging from resting chairs, room dividers, kitchen tables and heaters.
While the move by the council can be justified from a debt recovery point of view, it is fundamentally flawed because it is akin to robbing residents of their hard-earned cash and furniture.
The city council’s billing system is archaic and no-one can vouch for the accuracy of the amounts they are demanding from ratepayers. Worse still, the council bills for water that is prevalently scarce.
The little that drips out of the city taps is not safe to drink.
There are numerous studies indicating that the water is heavily contaminated with carcinogenic chemicals that can cause a range of illnesses.
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Frequent outbreaks of cholera and typhoid, that have left residents out of pocket as they constantly seek treatment, have been blamed on municipal water.
Think about when refuse trucks last visited your suburb, yet council continues to bill for refuse collection.
The council has also failed to resuscitate pothole-laden roads and malfunctioning street lights, which have allowed criminals to operate at night. Council’s dismal performance in service delivery is amplified by its failure to maintain its very own buildings, which are crumbling.
In view of the above, there can be no justification for the city council to play hardball with residents who have, for years, paid for services not rendered by council.
Instead of enlisting the services of debt collectors and the messenger of court, the city council should find a way to first improve service delivery i.e to ensure clean water is always available, refuse is collected and sewer pipe bursts are attended to in time.
Only when all these are accompished can the city council expect residents to co-operate.
