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Councillors need training for improved service delivery
Centre for Community Development in Zimbabwe (CCDZ)
November 06, 2008

The Centre for Community Development in Zimbabwe calls upon NGOs to ignore and mount a legal challenge against the outgoing Minister of Local government, Ignatius Chombo who has issued a meaningless statement banning training programmes being provided to councillors by NGOs. The press statement by Chombo as reported in the Herald of 6th November, 2008 is a legal nullity.

It is time that the ZANU PF government treats NGOs as partners in development and not as rivals. The Local Government training programmes provided by CCDZ and other NGOs are non-partisan and aimed at strengthening local authorities for improved service delivery in Zimbabwe. Civic leaders who have received these trainings have commended CCDZ since government is failing to provide these training programmes.

Through the Building Effective Local governance programme, CCDZ is running training programmes for councillors and other council/municipal leaders to improve service delivery. The CCDZ programme is a non-partisan programme which is based on a Local Governance Training Manual produced by CCDZ with inputs from eminent scholars in the field of political science, local government and public administration.

We note with concern Chombo's interference with local government rather than concentrating on providing the basic services such as water, electricity, sanitation and food. Chombo has on several occasions dismissed legally constituted and democratically elected Councillors and Mayors especially in those councils dominated by the opposition MDC and hurriedly replaced them with ZANU PF apologists.

We also note that Chombo recently sponsored the Local Government Amendment Act No. 1 of 2008 in which he gave himself powers to appoint 25% of Councillors in Council under the guise of representing "special interests". The Mayor's office was rendered powerless as Chombo gave executive power to Town Clerks who are ZANU PF appointees. It is clear that Chombo is not comfortable with the prevailing situation where most of the Councils especially urban councils now fall under the opposition party. Chombo wants the MDC-dominated councils to fail so that he can justify appointing his Commissions to run the affairs of council. This behaviour smacks of hypocrisy and goes to show that President Mugabe and a cohort of his Ministers like Chombo are not sincere with the formation of an inclusive Government between ZANU PF and the MDC.

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