Peri-urban service provision: Whose baby is it?
ZIMBABWE comprises three tiers of Government — the national Government, the provincial and metropolitan councils and local authorities.
There are 10 administrative provinces, including two metropolitan, and in those provinces, there are districts, wards and villages.
Each province has a given number of local authorities (councils), which are a third tier of government. The local authorities are divided into two, that is, urban councils and rural councils.
According to the Constitution of Zimbabwe (Chapter 1: Section 5 (c), urban councils represent and manage the affairs of people in urban areas, while rural councils represent and manage the affairs of people in rural areas within the districts into which the provinces are divided.
Interestingly, rural and urban councils share boundaries.
Urban expansion is permissible at law, and the urban council can identify land within the jurisdiction of a rural council for the purposes of urban expansion in line with its Master Plan.
Upon land identification, the local authority writes to the parent ministry, which in this case is the Ministry of Local Government and Public Works.
The Ministry in turn writes to the ministry responsible for Lands, Agriculture, Water and Rural Resettlement, who are the custodians of rural/agricultural land which often surrounds most of the urban councils.
The Ministry of Lands will initiate the acquisition processes such as gazetting, valuation for compensation purposes, among a host of other administrative processes.
Once the land acquisition procedures are complete, they then hand over the acquired land to the Ministry of Local Government.
When the land is alienated as urban State land, it is then handed over to the applicant urban council for urban expansion.
This simply entails legally extending the boundaries of the expanding council, while reducing those of the ceding council.
Urban expansion entails land use planning, infrastructure designing and emplacement as well as provision of social amenities like schools, health and recreational facilities, transport facilities, waste management, environmental management, energy, transport, workspaces, commercial centres, industrial zones, and office space, among many others.
The physical infrastructure such as off-site and on-site services are a must and it is the obligation of the urban council to provide all these services in conjunction with the Government.
Social infrastructure is equally vital and should be provided as such. All these necessities are, in my view, what the Constitution is referring to as “the affairs of people in urban areas”.
Admittedly, this is merely rudimentary interpretation of the law from a layman’s viewpoint.
The rural areas have growth points, district service centres and rural service centres that resemble an urban set-up, but are still designated as rural as per protocol.
There are many examples that come to mind, like Gutu, Chivhu, Murehwa, Chivi, Murombedzi and Dema.
It is the responsibility of the respective councils to “represent and manage the affairs of people in rural areas”.
Literally, this entails service provision along the same lines as the urban councils. The local authority is the planning authority within its area of jurisdiction.
All developments are sanctioned by the respective local authority. People expect services from councils regardless of being urban or rural. There are services befitting any settlement.
As enunciated earlier on, urban and rural councils share boundaries. There seem to have been a cold war on the boundary issues waged between rural and urban councils.
For instance, City of Harare shares boundaries with rural councils such as Goromonzi and Zvimba, Chitungwiza shares boundaries with Manyame, Bulawayo shares with Umguza, Chegutu Municipality shares with Chegutu Rural and Lupane Local Board shares with Kusile Rural District Council to mention, but a few.
The area in the vicinity of the urban council boundaries is what I am referring to as peri-urban.
There seems to be a misconception that the urban councils are “big brothers” to rural councils.
Maybe the fallacy emanates from the notion that an urban council can possibly expand into the rural area territory while the latter cannot expand into the former’s area of jurisdiction.
Ironically, the rural councils have realised the opportunities brought about by housing development.
Of late, there has been an untold and deliberate attempt to stop further expansion of conventional urban councils. They have initiated housing developments right on the borders with the urban councils.
There are many examples to substantiate this allegation.
Zvimba RDC has planned and allocated stands and plots at Rainham Farm on the periphery of Harare. Manyame RDC has developed stands right on the borders with Chitungwiza Municipality.
Goromonzi has developed stands right on the edges of Ruwa Local Board and City of Harare. Umguza has done the same with City of Bulawayo.
All these rural councils seem to lack the muscles to provide the requisite infrastructure, let alone the requisite social and economic infrastructure.
As a result, the residents of such settlements expect services to be provided by the nearby urban council.
This has created dormitories, where for instance, people drive or commute from Domboshava or Melfort in Goromonzi to work in Harare or Ruwa.
Kids are attending schools in Harare instead of Zvimba, while medical facilities are accessed from Bulawayo instead of Umguza.
Consequently, urban councils have been inundated with demand for services with residents from rural councils.
Surprisingly, when it comes to revenue collection, the rural council collects all the money, but the main question is: “Is it the responsibility of the urban councils to provide services to rural council’s residents?