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Regime meddling exposed
Combined Harare Residents Association (CHRA)
Extracted from The Resident, Issue 41
September 02, 2004

This article was adapted as is from Councillor Laban’s (Former Councillor Now!) occasional Newsletter. The travails of governance in the city have also been extended to council officials...

We have a report from the Director of Works (DOW) to the Executive Committee, dated 17 July and laid on the table at the Executive Committee meeting of 19 July this year. It states that the DOW has done as he has been told to do, but he has some objections.

His instructions are attached; a memo from the Acting Mayor, S. Makwavarara and signed by her, to the Acting Town Clerk, dated 14 July 2004 with the subject "Reinstatement of Dept of Works Employees". It is a short memo, only two sentences : "I refer to our meeting with the Honourable Governor, Cde Witness Mangwende this afternoon. Could you please ensure that the Acting Human Resources Director is advised accordingly on the above mentioned subject to enable the employees to resume duty on Monday 19 July 2004."

The Acting Town Clerk instructed the DOW who reported that the four employees were suspended last year in August and October following an illegal job action. A Council Disciplinary Inquiries Committee found them guilty of assaulting municipal employees during the job action . They also turned off the water supply to high-density suburbs. Furthermore they are under police investigation at the moment. One employee has been phoning Highfield Works and Firle Sewerage works with threats and boasting that he will be reinstated.

The DOW believes that reinstating these employees will be bad for staff morale. There is no mention of this in the Executive Committee minutes of 19 July or in full Council minutes. What we have here is a discussion between the Governor and the so-called Acting Mayor, following which four employees are reinstated despite their crimes, the disciplinary inquiry results, ongoing police investigation and one's intimidation. So there are four thugs taking our pay (your rates) for reasons that we can only assume are Mangwende's personal or Zanu PF 's partisan politics. Who, we should ask, is interfering in Council activities?

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