Suburban
Diana Nherera Suburban Reporter
WARD 8 Councillor Keith Charumbira says the City of Harare should stop the tendency of holding endless meetings to discuss problems that are known without coming up with solutions to solve the challenges.
He was speaking at last week’s special council meeting where he it was heard that refuse collection continues to be a challenge in most parts of Harare with Ward 8 residents saying there is no planned schedule for the collection of garbage in the ward.
Ward 8 covers Highlands, Chisipite, Newlands, Ballantyne Park, Colne Valley, parts of Eastlea, parts of Gunhill.
Residents are always complaining about non collection of refuse and in the cases where the refuse compactors are spotted in the suburbs the waste collectors are not collecting from all households. The waste collectors are said to be speeding past houses without emptying all the rubbish bins.
Councillor Charumbira has suggested that the City of Harare should have a refuse collection schedule and regular collections following erratic garbage collections.
In a recent interview with Suburban, Cllr Charumbira said Ward 8 does not have regular refuse collection.
Speaking at a special council meeting on service delivery held last week, Cllr Charumbira also urged council to repair grounded refuse compactors in order to improve refuse collection in Harare.
“What we expect as council in our communities is a schedule of when refuse will be collected. Whether its once a week or once a month in terms of the capacity that we have than for us to continuously meet here and discuss the fleet availability and repairs being carried out to the grounded refuse compactors at the council workshop,” he said.
Cllr Charumbira questioned why the city is not improving its fleet maintenance.
“We need to prioritise the repairs of compactors, those that are available,” he said.
Cllr Charumbira blamed council for concentrating on other things at the expense of refuse collection.
“It seems we are now concentrating on new things now and again that are very expensive all the time while we don’t have the capacity to have those materials now and again.
“That means we will get to December without proper and effective collection of refuse.
“Let’s come out of this meeting whilst we have a department telling us clearly when are we going to restore effective collection of garbage in our communities. That’s what we want to hear. When are we going to have effective collection of refuse in our wards? When are we going to have each and every ward having its own truck for effectiveness on refuse collection? We don’t just come here to these meetings, deliberate and we go and next time we are on the same agenda. How can we improve the city? How can we run it when we are continually on the same page and next meeting we come, we have these excuses?”
Cllr Charumbira said people were waiting for solutions and not endless meetings where all sorts of excuses are proffered.
“What we want are proper, genuine solutions so as to deliver services to the citizens of Zimbabwe.
“If the department is completely failing, let us state the failures here and deal with the failures once and for all.
“Your Worship, let us not waste time continuously deliberating matters whilst we have technical staff employed in this department to think and to implement and to run the show on the ground,” he said.
Acting city amenities manager Engineer Keith Mapunzamoyo said his department is requesting control over allocation of funds.
“So for the period under review committed to the end of December we request consistent allocation of at least $10m per week from the finance director’s office and can the director of works be accountable for that expenditure and also his own time?” he said.
Harare Mayor Jacob Mafume asked the city officials how many compactors can be repaired agreements with residents.
Eng Mapunzamoyo said they can repair between 46 to 50 trucks.
“We need about 28 trucks.
“We have already been engaged by Borrowdale although there are some reservations.
“Then there is also Mbare and they have repaired two trucks.
“We have also Mt Pleasant, Greendale and Highlands who have engaged the director of works to come in and repair the trucks,” he said.
Cllr Mafume urged the finance director to come up with a system that can ensure that the amenities department get money to keep the refuse compactors up and running in sufficient quantities.
Cllr Charumbira said council’s Environmental Management Committee should make a resolution for the establishment of waste collection centres.
He said it is not clear if the city planners have visited the sites where the waste collection centres can be established.
“It will minimise the issues to do with expenses in terms of collection of waste in local areas,” said Cllr Charumbira.
