Clever Taperamoyo

MASVINGO – Council on Tuesday unveiled various Civic Awards won by the city over the past year, with emphasis being put on improving service delivery.
The Civic Awards were won during the 2016/2017 period as various stakeholders noted improvements in such fields as service delivery, budgetary control, gender equality, municipal services and community engagement.
Addressing people who came to witness the unveiling, City of Masvingo mayor, Hubert Fidze said council was preoccupied with improving services especially the provision of sufficient clean water to drink as well as regular refuse removal.
He also said vehicles purchased through the road levy were now being used to resurface some roads around the city.
“These Civic Awards are a testimony of the cordial relationship between residents as ratepayers and council. Without unity and working together among us, we could not have won these awards,” Fidze said.
City of Masvingo Town Clerk, Adolf Gusha also weighed in and praised the unity of purpose that he said existed in council despite the Councillors being of different political persuasions.
He emphasised the need to ensure that essential services like water, sanitation, health and burial facilities are always available regardless of who is in charge.local

Clever Taperamoyo

City of Masvingo mayor Hubert Fidze on Wednesday, October 18, launched the Mayor’s Christmas Cheer Fund 2017 as part of efforts to mobilise resources to give to the disadvantaged this festive season.
The fund is customary fundraising initiative which is designed to mobilise resources that are then distributed to the elderly, the poor, the disabled and disadvantaged children towards Christmas.
Last year, the fund raised some US$7 015 which was donated to such charities as Copota school for the blind, Alpha Cottages children’s home, Association for the Visually Handicapped, Pioneer Trust, Masvingo General Hospital and Mucheke Old People’s Home.
Fidze made a passionate plea to the public to show generosity to the less fortunate members of the community.
“Like I have done over the previous years, I am making an appeal to the business community and individuals to give the less fortunate people in our community a reason to smile this festive season,” Fidze said.
He also took the opportunity to urge residents to serve water saying at the moment, council was not only able to pump 30 mega litres of water per day against an average daily consumption requirement of 48 mega litres.local

GUTU – A popular council bar at Chinyika business centre has been shut down, renovated and converted for use by the Ministry of Home Affairs and Zimbabwe Electoral Commission (ZEC) which is on a drive to reach out to more people to register to vote.
The building is now being used by the Registrar General’s office to issue birth certificates and national identity card as well as by the electoral body to register people as voters.
During an interview with TellZim News, Member of Parliament for Gutu North, Ticharwa Madondo said it was pointless to have a bar when people were not registered to vote.
“This renovation was done so as to help citizens to acquire the required documentation needed for one to vote,” said Madondo.
He told residents that he hoped the building will continue to serve its new purpose even after next year’s elections, saying a bar was less important than identity documents and the right to vote.
“I am going to raise an issue in Parliament that government should allow all citizens to have a national identity card even those without birth certificates. This will boost people’s morale and many will go to register to vote,” said Madondo.
Some people who spoke to TellZim News, however, expressed disappointment with the change of use, saying the bar used to be their favourite drinking joint where friends will find leisure after a hard day’s work.local

MASVINGO – Charumbira Primary School recently held an official opening ceremony for a two-classroom block which was constructed using resources from the Central Emergency Respond Fund (CERF) which created by Unicef to assist schools repair facilities destroyed by bad weather.
Speaking on behalf of the Provincial Education Director (PED) Zedius Chitiga, Masvingo District Schools Inspector (DSI) Ishmael Chigaba thanked parents and the school head for working together for the success of the project.
“On behalf of the Ministry, I would like to thank our parents and the school for a job well done. I encourage the parents and the school leadership to now focus their attention at upgrading other blocks,” Chigaba said.
He urged the school head to take advantage of the US$27 000 that will be distributed towards building Early Childhood Development (ECD) facilities in schools.
Chigaba also emphasised the need to start embarking on homegrown school feeding programmes, saying it was the responsibility of parents to feed their children.
Charumbira Primary School head Choice Mazhata thanked her staff, the School Development Committee (SDC), Chief Fortune Charumbira, Chitiga and CERF for their work which saw the project succeeding.
Established in the 1940s, the school has an enrollment of 491 pupils but most of its facilities are in need of urgent upgrades.local

GWERU – Council has admitted that it lacks capacity to collect refuse across the city owing to broken down waste removal vehicles and will soon outsource the service to private companies, TellZim News has learnt.
This comes shortly after council announced it was putting back to tender the supply of service delivery vehicles because the company that won the initial bid failed to do the job citing foreign currency shortages.
In a circular drafted after a special council meeting held recently, the city said it will contract private transporters to collect waste.
“Following the challenges experienced in the collection of solid waste due to inadequate refuse compactor trucks and frequent breakdowns due to ageing, the City of Gweru invites interested members of the community owning trucks ranging from 3.5 tonnes to 10 tonnes to submit their bids to the director of health services for consideration and possible hire of their vehicles for solid waste removal,” reads part of the circular.
Residents who spoke to TellZim News, however, were of the opinion that the plan will breed more corruption and patronage.
“No promise given to us residents has ever been fulfilled and all they think about is fattening their pockets. Think of how many of them or close relatives own such trucks? It’s those people who will be given the tenders and none of the plans are meant to serve us,” said a resident.
Learnmore Tafirenyika of Ascot said he expected nothing to improve as all council initiatives in the past have shown to be either ill-conceived or were made to promote self-interest.
 “We have experienced poor service delivery by city council for a long time now and as the people, we have no confidence that their latest plans are well-meant. The people are throwing waste everywhere because they don’t have a choice,” said Tafirenyika.
The council has targeted areas like Woodlands, Ascot, Northleagh, Athlone, Nashville and KMP-Senga for waste collection by the private truckers.local