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Patrick Chitumba, [email protected]

THE decision by the Gweru City Council (GCC) to indefinitely suspend interviews towards the recruitment of a substantive town clerk has attracted backlash from residents amid allegations of interference from people in influential positions.

The local authority had short-listed eight candidates to attend interviews on February 14 as part of a process to have a substantive town clerk to replace Ms Elizabeth Gwatipedza who was fired in 2019.

GCC mayor, Councillor Martin Chivhoko, last month said the calibre of applications did not meet the standards the city is looking for in a potential town clerk.

However, while addressing residents and stakeholders attending the recent “State of the City” address at the town house, Clr Chivhoko said they had shelved the recruitment because they were meeting a lot of resistance and disturbances in carrying out the process.

“There are many interested parties who want the process to be done their way. Because of that, we have suspended recruitment of the town clerk,” he said. 

“There are a lot of interested parties and as a result we are facing challenges from everywhere.”

Clr Chivhoko said in the beginning, there were claims that they had left out some qualifications on the advert.

“We added the qualifications on the other advert but two days before the interviews, more issues were raised such as the independence of the short-listing panel, the independence of the interview panel and so forth,” he said. 

“We, therefore, decided that it was good for the city to remain as it is. Everything is going on well, at least I feel things are moving in the right direction.”

Clr Chivhoko said following the decision to postpone the recruitment process, they were no longer under pressure to recruit and will only do so when it is the right time.

Gweru United Progressive Residents and Ratepayers Association director, Pastor David Chikore, said it was unfortunate that GCC was violating its own policy on employees serving in an acting capacity.

He said the policy clearly states that no employee shall serve in an acting capacity for more than six months.

“There is a requirement that in the event a post runs for six months being run under an official, albeit in an acting capacity, the post should be advertised and duly filled by engaging a qualified candidate on a substantive basis,” he said.

Mr Chikore said as residents, they believed that this policy position was reached after thorough and objective consideration of several factors in the quest to create an efficient council administration.

“It, therefore, comes as a saddening shock when a whole council deliberates and decides to flout its own policy by suspending indefinitely the recruitment process for a substantive town clerk, the most senior position in council administration, which should be the engine room driving all council operations,” he said.

Mr Chikore said while they do not dispute that acting town clerk, Mr Livingstone Churu, might have made positive strides towards improving service delivery in the city, a substantive officer must be urgently recruited.

“We are uncomfortable with a decision, which opts for the path of least resistance, the path of flouting own internal policies. While the intention might be noble, it might have far reaching effects in the long run as corporates of repute would ordinarily shun partnering with an entity that indicates right but turns left,” he said. 

“The twin evils of unpredictability and policy inconsistency often drive away investors.”

Gweru District Development Co-ordinator Mr Tarisai Mudadigwa said the failure to fill vacant posts was a burden on the Ministry of Local Government and residents.

“Our performance is measured on the performance of local authorities and failure to fill the vacancies is a burden to us. We want to encourage council and everyone who has a role to play to ensure they deliver,” he said.

Last year, the local authority placed an advert in the newspapers inviting aspiring candidates to apply to fill the post and the closing date was December 4.

A total of 24 people applied for the job amid indications that those who submitted their CVs failed to make the grade resulting in the council re-advertising.

After the screening process, only four out of 24 applicants met the requirements as per the advertisement.

However, the number was not enough for the council to go ahead with the interviews forcing the local authority to re-advertise the vacant post of town clerk.

At the close of January 3 deadline for new applicants,               eight candidates were then invited to attend the February 14 interviews.

The post fell vacant following the dismissal of Ms Gwatipedza who was found guilty on three charges that included disobeying a lawful order to submit her contract of employment and those of other departmental heads.

After her dismissal, GCC appointed its chamber secretary Mr Vakai Douglas Chikwekwe as the acting town clerk before he later resigned alleging persecution and victimisation by the Citizens Coalition for Change (CCC) councillors. He was replaced by the city’s finance director Mr Churu.