Councillors want the lease of Kwekwe Bri-cks by Zanu PF provincial executive me-mber Owen Ncube reversed because they say it is not clear how it would benefit the local authority.
Lucia Mnkandla, the acting Kwekwe town clerk told a full council meeting recently that she could not tell the councillors the terms of the lease because they had failed to locate the agreement.
Mnkandla said she could also not say how much the council had realised from the deal but indicated that moves were now being made to terminate the lease.
But Ncube, who is a close ally of Minister of Defence Emmerson Mnangagwa and former Zanu PF provincial chairman July Moyo, said he was not aware of a letter from council indicating an intention to cancel the lease.
“That letter has not come through to me and therefore I cannot talk about it,” Ncube said.
“We have a lease agreement with council which was signed around 2006 and will run for 10 years.
“Anyone who thinks he can terminate that lease outside the legal requirements must have money.”
Councillors wanted to know the terms of the lease which was signed by the previous Zanu PF council led by former mayor, Stanford Bonyongwa.
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They accused the previous Zanu PF councillors of conniving to use council property to enrich their peers in the party resulting in the local authority being prejudiced of potential revenue.
Ncube dismissed the accusations saying the deal was purely business and had nothing to do with politics.
However, Councillor Weston Masiya told the council meeting that the local authority was losing revenue since the plant was lying idle.
“We are losing revenue by not taking stock of our properties and demanding what is due to this city,” he said.
“I sense a lot of corruption which is happening here and there is need to correct it.
“How can council lease out a property and say they can’t find the lease agreement.”
Mayor Shadreck Tobaiwa said there was deep-rooted corruption at council, dating back to the tenure of previous Zanu PF councils.
He said his council will revisit all “shady deals” with a view of reversing them.
