Probe Mutare City Council workers, ZACC advised
THE Zimbabwe Anti-Corruption Commission (ZACC) should investigate Mutare City Council officials and bring to book those who were involved in underhand land deals, auditors who carried out a forensic land audit on council have recommended.
According to the report, council management, which was under former town clerk Mr Obert Muzawazi, was involved in underhand deals in land allocation, prejudicing the local authority of thousands of dollars in potential revenue.
Auditors from the Ministry of Local Government, Public Works and National Housing noted that there was land mismanagement within council hence the need for further investigations.
“Council should cause officers involved and who are still in council employment to account for their actions in land mismanagement as highlighted in this report,” said the audit report.
“This report recommends that some matters be investigated further through the assistance of the ZACC that should be sought to interrogate further on council employees and third parties involved in land sale scams,” recommended the auditors.
The auditors also recommended that council should adhere to the requirements of standing regulations when issuing out land to retain the value of land sold.
The audit revealed that council lost almost $80 842 in potential revenue in stands which were sold to councillors after being undervalued.
Some councillors were said to have not paid anything to council since 2015 when they acquired the stands.
“The under-pricing of stands sold was due to ineffectiveness by council management in carrying out their responsibilities.
“Some of the councillors who were allocated low density residential stands had no capacity to pay for the stands,” said the report.
The report also blasted the then council management for failing to keep control registers for land management such as land bank, stands, waiting list and allocation and cession registers.
“There was no transparency in the manner stands were created and allocated to beneficiaries as there were two parallel systems in place for the same function of issuing of stands and there was no integration of such records or functions,” said the report.