Barely a week after the Zimbabwe National Road Administration (Zinara) announced the extension of the registration deadline for motorists to acquire new computerised licence discs, there was a sudden change of mind.
What influenced the decision to revoke the earlier relaxation of the deadline to June 30, according to Zinara, was because motorists had stopped licensing their vehicles following the announcement.
The new system will be run from a central server at Zinara head office and the disc contains all information relating to a vehicle such as make, model and registration number.
The reasoning behind the revocation of the deadline is shocking, to say the least. Did Zinara do an audit to prove that the disappearance of queues at outposts selling the discs meant that motorists were no longer purchasing the discs?
We can only wonder what kind of reasoning this is. It must be made clear to Zinara and all other State entities that are fond of seeing people queuing that queues are a sign of poor management.
If Zinara was organised at all, the chaos that obtained in the run-up to the June 1 deadline would not have occurred.
Just so Zinara is made aware, the long queues that formed were not caused by “genuine” motor vehicle owners, but fortune seekers who saw an opportunity to make a quick buck out of the desperate motoring public that does not have five hours to spend in the queue just to register.
What we are seeing at Zinara is a worrying development of an institution trying to get its way without any accountability.
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Just last week, Zinara said some of the licencing outlets had been affected by power cuts, among other issues.
What has changed now in the face of increased power cuts?
Although thousands of motorists encountered problems in securing the discs, Zinara insisted that everyone should have the new vehicle licence by June 1.
The authority insisted it would not grant any grace period and motorists who failed to meet the deadline would be penalised.
It said it would set the police on motorists who do not have the discs, whatever that means. The corruption at police roadblocks on the highways would worsen. The process to obtain the discs, according to motorists, is tedious as officials had to enter every detail in their computers and for Zinara to sweep the concerns of the public under the carpet is reckless.
After all is said and done, Zinara should be held to account for every cent they collect through this exercise which has been characterised by extraordinary incompetence. Zinara should be held up as emblematic of how parastatals operate.
