CONSTITUTIONAL law expert Lovemore Madhuku has urged Harare residents to organise wildcat demonstrations to force town clerk Tendai Mahachi and his top management team to leave office over poor service delivery.
BY MOSES MATENGA
Speaking at a public discussion forum organised by the Combined Harare Residents’ Association on Wednesday, Madhuku said the residents were constitutionally empowered to demonstrate against poor service delivery.
“For us to have service delivered, let’s be political and demand it. They are eggs used in Europe. Councillors are allowed to throw eggs at officials,” Madhuku said.
“Take those eggs and it’s not a crime to throw eggs at officials. Just throw eggs at them, journalists will take pictures and that will change a lot, you can even throw bread, it’s soft and they can’t say it’s assault, I will defend you on that one.”
The residents expressed anger over council management’s alleged arrogance and failure to deliver.
They also rapped Mahachi’s team for allegedly boycotting the meeting although they had been formally invited.
The residents’ association said it had invited Mahachi, mayor Bernard Manyenyeni, former mayors Muchadeyi Masunda and Elias Mudzuri, Madhuku and former Chitungwiza acting chamber secretary Last Madzivanyika, among others, to discuss the council’s poor services.
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“He (Mahachi) gets a salary and allowances every month that is enough to pay for councillors’ allowances across the country, but he has seen it fit not to come here to interface with us who pay him. Are we paying him for snubbing meetings?” Chitungwiza Residents’ Trust representative Marvelous Khumalo fumed.
Manyenyeni said his council was still financially crippled from Local Government minister Ignatius Chombo’s 2013 directive where all local authorities were ordered to write off residents’ debts shortly before the general elections. He warned that the Zanu PF government might be tempted to issue a similar directive ahead of the 2018 polls.
Mudzuri assured councillors that residents were behind them and should not feel intimidated when discharging their duties. He said that the problem at Town House was the arrogance of management who bank on protection from Chombo.
Meanwhile, human rights lawyers yesterday gave Harare City Council a 48-hour ultimatum to address the health hazard at Glen View 4 Primary School where raw sewage has spilled into the school yard, exposing over 1 000 children to water and airborne diseases.
