shloboe boe
Stephen Mpofu, Perspective
Bulawayo, for years our country’s open window to international trade transactions courtesy of the annual Zimbabwe International Trade Fair (ZITF) in the famed City of Kings and Queens, risks being turned into a no-go area by corrupt council workers if no swift remedial action is taken to rein in the offending employees.
Not only that, but the Government might consider bringing in outsiders to take care of service delivery, as what is reportedly planned for our capital city, Harare, after a commission of enquiry is said to have exposed unorthodox, and therefore scandalous/corrupt activities by some city council employees — scars that bear negative repercussions for the country with Harare as the seat of our Government.
The report that outsiders might have to be brought in to superintend council service delivery has sent some Harare City Council employees ranting to the effect that any such action preferring foreign workers at the expense of locals would be against the government’s devolution programme in which Zimbabweans are mandated to improve their lot.
(But devolution does not in any way condone unethical practices, such as corruption in service or other deliveries, by council employees mandated to improve the lot of people by their local authority.)
In the city of Bulawayo, top officials have expressed concern about widespread corruption and solicitation of bribes among staff members, particularly within the traffic and security sector, as reported in this paper earlier this week on Tuesday.
The admission by senior officials comes barely two months after Deputy Mayor Councillor Edwin Ndlovu and Finance Committee chairperson Mpumelelo Moyo were arrested in November, after being implicated in corrupt practices.
That no no-nonsense action has so far been taken by the Bulawayo City Council to rid itself of offending employees certainly puts at risk foreign business executives or their representatives of being victims of corrupt scums by council employees when in Bulawayo for the ZITF.
When that happens, the possibility of foreign countries saying goodbye to Zimbabwe and ZITF in anger at the harassment of their representatives should not be ruled out, which suggests that our government’s anti-corruption squad should be loosed to clean up local authorities that have their images marred by corrupt practices.
Zimbabweans should not, and certainly cannot be standalones in business without the support/interactions with other business drivers in the global village.
Time is now for the government’s anti-corruption team to pounce on any and all local authorities where scandalous worms wriggle at the expense of the good name of our motherland.
After all, any wrong doing by companies, organisations or individuals or individuals in a country is blamed in the outside on a government’s weakness to clean up the mess.
