Gweru wants to borrow ZWL $100 million for cars

Munashe Mukahlera

Authorities in Zimbabwe’s third largest city, Gweru want to borrow 100 million Zimbabwe dollars to buy 30 utility vehicles. The local authority put up a notice in the press on Sunday inviting input from ratepayers.

The proposal comes at a time when residents in the city are not pleased with the level of service delivery. Recently, council clashed with residents over the purchase of a Toyota land cruiser VX worth US$176 000, for fired town clerk Elizabeth Gwatipedza.

The executive director of the Gweru residents and ratepayers association said, “It’s always important for local authorities to ask for permission to borrow money whenever they have serious challenges in regards to service delivery. The challenge that we are facing is they are trying to borrow money to buy utility vehicles yet recently they spent about US$176 000.

At the end of the day you then realize that the challenge is not that we don’t have money but it is how we are using the money that is in our coffers. So this application will not serve any purpose because what will then happen is that we will have a serious debt as a local authority. A debt that we will not be able to pay back because in terms of collection, our local authority is not collecting money from residents,” he said.

Acting Town Clerk Vakai Chikwekwe could not be immediately reached for comment. When ZTN called, his mobile phone was answered by a person who identified himself as his brother.