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Felex Share, Harare Bureau
THE tendering process for the construction of model high-rise flats for civil servants has begun and the adjudication exercise will be handled by Government and workers’ representatives.

The two parties will be guided by the State Procurement Board.

This emerged from a meeting civil servants representatives under the banner Apex Council had with officials from the Ministry of Local Government, Public Works and National Housing in Harare yesterday.

The parties agreed that the adjudication would have three representatives from each side.

Speaking after the meeting yesterday, Apex Council chairperson Mrs Cecelia Alexander, said the workers’ side was happy with the progress being registered on the scheme.

The scheme is part of Government’s non-monetary incentive to its employees.

“The meeting brought an update on the tendering process,” said Mrs Alexander.

“Remember we are going through the State Procurement Board and the Ministry now awaits feedback from the procurement board on such issues as tender advertisement date and closing date for the same.

“On the adjudication process, we have agreed that there will be a team comprising of directors from the Ministry of Local Government, Public Works and National Housing and members of the Apex Council. Each side will have three members.

“They will handle everything with regards to the bids and obviously with guidance from the State Procurement Board. We don’t expect any challenges since every part will be represented.”

Harare and Bulawayo will each have two blocks of flats as models, while every provincial capital will have one apartment each.

Government wants to minimise allocation of residential stands and concentrate on build­ing high ­rise apart­ments.

It has identified land in cities and towns on which the civil servants flats would be built.

The land is either owned by the State or councils, while in some areas it is already fully-serviced and ready for construction work to start.

More than 75 000 civil servants have registered to be part of the scheme and more are expected to come on board.

Mrs Alexander said civil servants would fill in stop order forms after completion of the tender process.

“On stop orders, we resolved that we wait for the tenders to go through and we get the actual prices of the flats then that’s when we will work on the contributions,” she said.

“People have to fill in the forms aware of the actual details of the scheme. As workers, we are happy with the progress, It should also be noted that we are not abandoning the residential stands issue. We are also working on that, it is just that we are beginning with flats. We are upbeat about the project.”

A two-bedroomed apartment is expected to cost about   $24 000.

Government is addressing the national housing backlog among civil servants in line with the Zim-Asset economic blueprint, which targets to provide 300 000 housing units by next year.

At least 500 000 civil servants are expected to benefit in the grand scheme, with financial institutions being roped in to offer affordable lines of credit.
Government is also urging civil servants to take up res­i­den­tial stands be­ing de­vel­oped by the In­fras­truc­tural De­vel­op­ment Bank of Zim­babwe (IDBZ).
IDBZ is de­vel­op­ing var­i­ous hous­ing projects across the coun­try in Harare, Masvingo, Kariba, Hwange, Kwekwe, as well as Gwanda, Plumtree and Beit­bridge.