By Clayton Shereni l Masvingo Correspondent
MASVINGO residents are up in arms with council after city fathers allegedly gave short notice of the ongoing 2023 budget consultations.
City of Masvingo stands accused of giving a notice barely 24 hours before the first meeting was held last week Thursday.
Residents’ representative organisation, Masvingo United Residents and Ratepayers Alliance (MURRA), has since written to the local authority demanding rescheduling of the consultative meetings.
However, council has reportedly chosen to ignore the letter dated October 6, 2022, written on behalf of residents by Mutendi, Mudisi and Shumba Legal Practitioners.
MURRA spokesperson, Godfrey Mtimba told NewZimbabwe.com the local authority was carrying out fake consultative meetings, which a were poorly attended due to lack of publicity.
“We are extremely concerned by the way council is conducting its consultations,” said Mtimba.
“The main worry is they ambushed residents barely 10 hours before the first meeting with invitations being sent on WhatsApp groups, so this has resulted in poor attendances at most of the meetings held so far. The budget process was a sham.”
RELATED:
- Masvingo’s iconic bus terminus now derelict edifice; glory days of Mhunga buses long gone
- Late disbursement of devolution funds derailing Masvingo’s priority projects
Some of the meetings had to be postponed after a handful of residents turned up with some progressing with a few attendees.
In Ward 5 and 6, consultations initially scheduled for October 10 were rescheduled to the next day after a few residents pitched up. In Ward 10, the indaba was attended by less than 20 people as residents cited bad timing.
Mtimba, however, also added that if no ‘proper’ consultations were done, the budget would not reflect residents’ priorities.
“We pleaded with them to defer the meetings for a week so that as stakeholders we could help mobilise residents and ratepayers adequately, but our pleas fell on deaf ears so we can’t say the budget will reflect the will of residents,” Mtimba added.
Masvingo residents have for the past few years cried foul on how the budget process is carried out.
The local authority has maintained it captures and gives priority to residents’ contributions during consultative meetings.
Masvingo Mayor, Collen Maboke wasn’t reachable for comment and didn’t respond to questions sent to him by the time of publishing.
Maboke is, however, on record saying council will pay a listening ear during consultations, and strive to include all residents’ concerns.
In recent years MURRA has written numerous times to Parliament seeking the nullification of inflated budgets done without consultations.
