HUNDREDS of Chitungwiza home-seekers besieged the town council offices yesterday demanding finality in a land scam where they were allegedly made to pay for non-existent residential stands in 2006.
REPORT BY MOSES MATENGA
The protestors were part of the 22 000 residents who bought residential stands under the Nyatsime Housing Project, but are yet to be allocated their stands.
Town clerk George Makunde indicated that he would meet the group tomorrow in the presence of provincial administrator Alfred Tome. Leader of the disgruntled residents, Alice Matambo, said: “We paid for the stands and we should get them. We spoke to the town clerk and we demanded that we be taken to that place now and he was not against that. He called Tome and he said he will be here on Wednesday.
“It’s been seven years now and we have nothing yet we paid for our stands. We paid Zimbabwe dollars in 2006 and we kept on topping up. Again, we were made to pay $900 top up and the land transfers were done. Despite having paid all this, I don’t know my stand number. The stand numbers have been changed three times and now council is not even acting.”
One of the affected residents Aaron Chitsinde said they may be forced to seek the intervention of Local Government minister Ignatius Chombo if Makunde and Tome failed to break the deadlock.
“We now want (Local Government minister Ignatius) Chombo himself to come and act on this issue. If government really cares about people, then the Nyatsime Project should be addressed because most of us here are homeless and we can’t pay rent when we invested in residential stands,” he said. Makunde could not be reached for comment as he was said to be busy.
Several Chitungwiza councillors and senior council officials have been implicated in shady land deals over the past few years, leading to the recent expulsion of housing director Jemimah Gumbo and incarceration of dismissed town clerk Godfrey Tanyanyiwa over corruption charges.
