ZANU-PF appointed Gweru City commissioners gobbling $1 000 a day

In Harare City Council two such farms have been incorporated in the City for planning and servicing. The Council has found that up to 250 000 people have been settled in these two farms without water, roads or sewerage facilities, no schools or clinics are planned and no recreation areas provided. The beneficiaries to whom these unlawfully settled families have paid money for the right to occupy their stands, have vanished.

This rampant abuse of the absolute poor in urban areas is being extended to attempts by the Zanu PF Party to exercise their control over the informal sector, In this way a criminal mafia has been established in Mbare where the informal sector markets and bus depots are being controlled by these gangs and money is extorted for the right to occupy vending stands or small plots for industrial activity. Senior members of the Zanu PF Party are linked to these activities and use these same structures to enforce compliance with voting activity and the operation of political activity and structures in these areas.

These wholesale abuses of the rights and needs of the Citizens of the Urban Councils have only one objective and that is to restore control by Zanu PF of all urban Wards and Constituencies in the next elections. In the process the Zanu PF is making life even more difficult and worse for the great majority or the urban population and all of this activity is not only illegal but fundamentally abuses the edicts of the new Constitution that was won after so many years of struggle.

At its epicenter is the Minister of Local Government. The MDC demands full compliance with the Constitution and for Zanu PF to cease and desist from all criminal and illegal activity which impacts the welfare and needs of the urban majority. Elected Councils and Councilors must be left alone to get on with the task and responsibilities they were elected for by the people of Zimbabwe. We also call upon the Judiciary to fulfill their responsibilities to the full in an impartial and professional manner.

E G Cross
Secretary for Local Government
MDC: Equal Opportunities for All

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