BY MOSES MATENGA
HARARE City Council has most of its fleet grounded because of minor faults and theft of vehicle parts by workers.
The capital’s city fathers are angry and demanding immediate disciplinary action against its workers for sleeping on duty and theft of vehicle parts.
Most city refuse collection trucks are currently grounded due to minor faults. Environment Management Committee chairperson Kudzai Kanzombe said it was shocking that the local authority was being accused of failure to collect refuse and exposing residents to health hazards because of minor faults that had grounded trucks at workshops across the city.
She said there were also reports of theft by workers of new spares parts bought for the trucks.
“We did a tour as the Environmental Management Committee after noticing discrepancies in reports we received. We made a resolution to have our waste management fleet repaired and increased from the 22 that we had to 46. We later noticed that despite all the financial commitments we were investing in the fleet, it was actually decreasing,” Kanzombe said after the tour.
Ordinarily, council should have 46 trucks, one for each ward.
After touring workshops in Highfield, Kopje, Mugombe automobile workshops and Nenyere, the committee heard that some trucks were down out of neglect.
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“That is unacceptable,” said Kanzombe. “There are refuse compactors that were down for simple things such as ATF oil, batteries and springs. A payment was then made to procure and fix the vehicles with a highly monitored programme, and equipment requesting procedure that makes it possible for the increase of our fleet to ensure better service delivery for our residents.”
Council has been under fire over failure to collect refuse, exposing millions of residents to water-borne diseases.
“We have now received reports of newly-purchased vehicle parts being stolen and swapped for reconditioned parts. There has been a tender that was awarded for CCTV two years ago to minimise the thefts, but up to now there has been no delivery,” Kanzombe said.
“There has to be a complete change of work culture in the city of Harare if we ever are to attain the smart city status by 2025. As policymakers, it is our mandate to ensure that residents get value of their money as we are the people’s councillors.”
