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Local municipalities doubling rent illegally if tenants miss deadline
Tererai Karimakwenda, SW Radio Africa
June 05, 2006

http://www.swradioafrica.com/news050606/rent050606.htm

We received a disturbing report from our contacts in the Mabvuku high-density area of Harare who said that the local administrators were charging residents double the rent if they did not pay it in full by the 7 th of the month.

Most residents cannot afford the rent as it is and are struggling to raise enough from month to month. But when it is doubled because they missed the deadline they go into debt and have their water and electricity cut off. To reconnect them costs even more, so they wind up being evicted. Our Mabvuku contacts allege that this is being done deliberately to make room for policemen and soldiers who are now looking for cheaper accommodation as prices soar.

One of the women we spoke with told us she is renting 2 rooms for Z$14,5 million a month. This includes water charges but not the electricity she uses. She said her last electric bill came in at Z$10 million making her total due for the month Z$24,5 million. The woman works as a domestic helper in a low density area and it costs her a lot of money to travel to work. Her monthly wages are currently Z$2,5 million. Needless to say there are several families cramped into her 2 rooms and that is how they are only just managing to pay for a roof over their heads.

The Mabvuku women told us a 2 kg chicken now costs Z$2,5 million or more depending, on where you find it. She joked about how they have forgotten what chicken tastes like and how beef was something they once ate in a dream. She also told us that it now costs Z$100,000 to travel from Budiriro to the city center, and that a litre of petrol was Z$350,000.

We asked our contacts why people are not driven mad enough by all this to just come out and demand change. They said they do not believe mass action in the streets will change anything and that they tried it and failed. "Unongo rohwa wodzoka kumba pasina chiwahwina (you will just get thoroughly beaten then you go home with no joy or change)." The solution they said will be in free and fair elections supervised by the United Nations or the international community in which Robert Mugabe would not be able to cheat.

They said Budiriro proved that Mugabe would be gone tomorrow if that environment was made possible.

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