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Albert Mugabe

Patrick Chitumba Midlands Bureau Chief
LOCAL authorities in the Midlands Province have received more than $2 million for road maintenance from the Zimbabwe National Road Authority (Zinara) since January this year.

Addressing chief executive officers, town secretaries and senior government officials at a meeting held in Gweru on Wednesday, Zinara chairman Albert Mugabe said urban councils in the Midlands Province were utilising the road fund well, but there were problems with some Rural Districts Councils who were failing to account for the monies. “Chirumhanzu RDC received $174,000, Gokwe North RDC $32,000 and we still have their other $32,000 provided they acquit their first disbursement. They also wanted to use some of the money to buy equipment but this money is not for that. Mberengwa RDC got $84,000 while Runde RDC received $77,000 and they have acquitted satisfactorily to receive a second disbursement. Tongogara got $77,000 but there is no second quarter disbursement because we are having this problem with a lot of road authorities who don’t have capacity to utilise road funds. Gokwe South received $73,000 and they have not acquitted to get second quarter funds,” said Mugabe.

Mugabe said Gokwe Town Council received about $116,000, Gweru City Council $235,000, Kwekwe City Council $138,000, Redcliff Town Council $125,000, Shurugwi Town Council $108,000 and Zvishavane Town Council $118,000. He said at one time, Shurugwi diverted Zinara funds towards the payment of salaries, which he said must not be repeated.

“So the province from the start of the year to date has received about $2,468,000 towards road maintenance,” said Mugabe adding that some local authorities were letting Zinara down through poor workmanship and failure to account for funds.

“Poor workmanship is bad and is taking the country backwards when we should be going forward. So we need your assistance so that we have a perfect road network in the country. Besides accounting for the money, we also want to see a neat and quality job,” he said.

Mugabe said in its quest for the country to have good roads, Zinara was going to introduce a programme for councils to get road construction equipment. He said the programme would see local authorities being asked to state the type of machinery they wanted. “Zinara is going to assist local authorities acquire equipment which they need. Roads authorities don’t have equipment and the funds we give them are finished by the contractors they hire to work on the roads. So we are working with RBZ to come up with a mechanisation fund,” Mugabe said.

“So we will now ask the representatives on the type of equipment they require. We no longer just buy and issue machinery without consulting first.

“We will do an exercise to see what we can afford to purchase for you because we want long lasting roads in the country.”

He also said Zinara had helped some municipalities with spare parts for 80 graders it purchased for them.

Mugabe said some of the graders had broken down.

“Most the graders were said to be down and we are assisting the road authorities to repair them. We have identified various spare parts which we are going to distribute to all recipients by November.

“These include nuts and bolts, engine oil, hydraulic oil and spare wheels to cut down on time wasted when the graders are broken down,” he said.