. . . battles to resolve land disputes

GWERU City Council has engaged a town planner and surveyor to deal with issues of illegal land sales and structures, amid revelations the local authority is battling to resolve several cases involving stands and structures it would have wrongly allocated.

In an interview, Gweru mayor, Councillor Charles Chikozho said there were several stands and structures that were in dispute after the local authority wrongly allocated them.

Cllr Chikozho was speaking after revelations that a local church, Light House Fellowship, was embroiled in a dispute with residents of Mkoba 11 over a stand that the council allocated to the church.

“As council, we are having a number of problems with regards to some of stands which the council allocated to clients when we were still using independent surveyors and town planners.

“Because of these irregularities, we have since engaged a surveyor and a town planner to deal with these issues which have been rocking the council,” said Cllr Chikozho.

He said the office of the town clerk has since instructed the surveyor to deal with the irregularities with the view of resolving existing disputes involving stands.

“We are investigating all these cases one by one, but because we have been using independent surveyors, we have said if it’s the council’s fault let those who would been wrongly allocated stands be compensated or get an alternative stand,” he said.

Cllr Chikozho was at the weekend sucked in another case of a disputed church stand in Mkoba Village 10, where some MDC-T youths attacked worshipers during a church service arguing that the church was blocking an access road which had been in existence for over 40 years.