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Report: Glen Norah B community centre meeting
Harare Residents Trust (HRT)
March 27, 2010

Present:
1. The Glen Norah Residents Trust Executive
2. Addmore Guzha, City of Harare, District Officer, Glen Norah
3. Domingo Shorai, Coordinator, Kadoma Residents Association
4. Precious Shumba, Coordinator, HRT
5. Miriam Feby Ngwasha, Revenue Officer
6. Highfield Residents' Trust executive (Three)

Agenda:

• Chairperson's Welcome Remarks
• Introductions
• Water disconnections
• Service delivery
• Etc

Attendance: 80 people

Opening Prayer:
The meeting started with a prayer from a volunteer resident.

Chairperson's Remarks:

Mrs Juliet Masiyembiri, the Chairperson of the Glen Norah B' residents' Trust welcomed all people and apologised for the late start. She told the residents that she moved around Glen Norah and observed heaps of garbage. She told the residents that when the Council provide trucks the residents will have to carry a clean up campaign. Masiyambiri also highlighted that vendors are facing constant arrests and they are failing to pay because the rates are too high. She also complained about the behaviour of workers from Council who were carrying an exercise of water disconnection that they broke the residence taps.

District Officer: Guzha

Refuse in Glen Norah remains uncollected and on Friday the city commissioned some refuse collection trucks. There is going to be some improvement on refuse collection. He said they have made proposals on skip bins on which he hoped the Councillors would explain how they will deal with this matter. He said if councillors were available they would have been explaining on their policy on the use of the vehicles but he lacked information. He said in the past residents would made reports on any faults or breakages of council property and these were recorded in a systematic way that made it easier for the workers to do follow ups on all maintenance work. He said this was not happening today because there were numerous challenges facing the City of Harare. Guzha reminded the residents that all municipalities face similar problems of inadequate service provision. It is important for residents to provide alternative ways of developing the city.

As the district office, they have received numerous complaints of houses being taken over by relatives and other unscrupulous people. The issue of change house ownership in Glen Norah is under investigation. The major challenge they have faced was that following the deaths of parents, heirs lacked knowledge of how to changer the ownership of their parents' properties. Under normal circumstances, the District Officer should be able to assist affected people with referral letters which have to be taken to community courts.

The DO said residents should be able to advocate for issues that affected the community.

Coordinator Kadoma: Mrs Domingo Shorai

She encouraged residents of Glen Norah to be brave and to work together towards development of their community. She also challenged the residents to also come up with alternatives to complement the work of the local authority. She said in Kadoma they have carried out clean up campaigns and this promoted hygienic practices. She urged the residents to work together with their policy-makers in the development of their community. Domingo said: "However, you must be independent and avoid leaning on any politician in your work because this community has people with diverse interests."

Harare Water Revenue Officer: Mrs Miriam Ngwasha

She said residents' needed to bear with the City Of Harare in terms of water provision. For the two years that the Zimbabwe National Water Authority (ZINWA) was responsible for water distribution in Harare, there was no money to do repairs. The City of Harare now has the responsibility to replace broken pipes and meters. However the water supplies have since improved. Residents are being charged 51% per annum interest over accruals that appear on statements while a 10 percent charge is placed on accruing rates. She said they regretted the damage done to water meters when council workers disconnected hundreds of defaulting residents. She said it was not intentional on their part to break peoples' pipes, but rather the taps have become rusty and worn out. She said the council will accept whatever amount people brought to them and will not have a situation where workers turned away people without sufficient money.

She said Harare Water charged residents with dysfunctional water meters based on estimates using average water consumption over a period of six months.

HRT Coordinator- Precious Shumba

Residents need information to be able to make informed decisions. It is important to understand the system of council administration and the roles of your elected representatives. Once this is understood, residents would make legitimate demands on their service providers and elected representatives as duty bearers. Citizens, as rights holders should not hesitate to point out the shortcomings of their councillors and service providers. The residents' body should remain non-partisan in order to remain relevant. He said the leadership should resist any attempts by politicians to neutralise them through bribes and other threats as witnessed in Highfield following their exposure of corruption on residents' houses.

Plenary: Residents' Views

• Does council consider the track record of residents' patterns of payment before disconnecting their water? People are suffering and are unable to settle these high bills.
• Our drinking water is unclean, the water has rust particles, we are now afraid to drink it because its life threatening.
• Rates are accumulating and we can't pay because we do not have any source of income, we are actually facing big challenges to fend for our families.
• Water meters are faulty, there is insufficient pressure from water to move the meter for recording purposes. The resident asked why is it that our faulty meters are taken when the new ones are fitted instead of being left with resident who would have bought the new one. D.O said that Meters were Council property and the problem is people tamper with meters and in some cases seriously misused.
• The high bills by Council have a ripple effect to Lodgers who are subsequently asked to pay high rentals by House owners
• Council has placed orders with their Works department for the repair of all public toilets, the D.O said. This followed complaints by residents that public toilets across Glen Norah were either locked or dysfunctional, posing a serious health hazard.
• Councillor Wellington Chikombo (Ward 28) in Glen Norah allegedly fired council employees identified as Charles Muchena, one Admire, Richard Mugwagwa, one Muzii and two other ladies identified as Edna and memory after they allegedly declined to do something illegal on his behalf. (The HRT is to meet the Councillor and the affected workers, whose addresses were provided by some residents.)
• There is inadequate information from council on how senior citizens can benefit from the facility of subsidised rates. The residents are being given the forms at Rowan Martin where city officials urge them to be secretive about it.
• "We were denied the opportunity to say what we expect to be in the budget of the council."
• The City of Harare should freeze all outstanding debts by residents and start afresh.
• Nearly five residents at the meeting raised serious concerns on the performance of the local clinic staff.
  • "People are suffering at the hands of the nurses, who are always hurling abuses at patients including the elderly, without restraint."
  • "It's painful, we want the clinic to be operational and be of benefit to the residents but it has become a nightmare."
  • Vanhu vanzwa nekushungurudzwa pachipatara pedu apa (people are tired of being abused at our local clinic)
  • "Maternity fees are too much and there is no proper handling of people."
  • "They are very rude at the clinic. I expect good services because they take our public funds at the end of every month." (47-year old man)
  • "You as the DO must tell your people at the clinic to respect us otherwise the clinic should be closed.
  • We go early, hoping to be attended to but we end up being very hungry, at the same time very thirsty, considering the illness, the situation becomes unbearable. Tell people if these nurses are on go-slow so that we know. There are elderly nurses in our community who can come in and replace the whole nursing staff at short notice. They are not the first to be treating people." (74-year old woman).
  • In response the DO said they have previously raised these issues with the nurses at the local clinic but it appeared that the situation remains bad for the residents. He said: "We want to invite the nurses to the residents' next meeting so that they hear what the residents are saying."
• The decision by the Minister of Energy and Power Development for ZESA to charge residents US$30 for electricity consumption in the high density areas is unfair as it meant that even those residents not getting electricity were paying for electricity not used.
• Big companies like Savannah, Cresta and Irvine's, are polluting Glen Norah but they are not ploughing back their profits into the community as their corporate social responsibility. The alternative is for these companies to employ our unemployed youths, women or provide resources to repair our roads and or carry our heaped garbage, said Titus Chipamuriwo, 42.
• There is overflowing sewerage in Glen Norah C' and Extension. Council has been notified but has taken too long to respond and repair the burst pipes.

Key Recommendations and Way Forward:

• The nurses at the local clinic to be invited to listen to people's concerns at the residents' next meeting.
• The HRT to advocate for a council policy that allows residents to be credited on their statements for purchases of own meters.
• All residents to pay rates and rentals they can afford.
• ZESA officials should be invited to address residents at the next meeting.
• A massive civic education campaign on citizens' duties and responsibilities has to be undertaken with partnership of civil society partners, council and business community.
• Convene monthly meetings on service delivery.

For details and comments please contact the Harare Residents' Trust (HRT) on +263 912 869 294, +263 733 296 806 or email us on hretrust@yahoo.com/ hretrust79@gmail.com

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