ZINARA throws punch back at HCC

By Desmond Makondora

.ZINARA reproaches Harare Council over road funds saga
.Harare City Council should account for road funds

Harare- Zimbabwe National Road Administration (ZINARA) has reproached Harare City Council over maintenance of roads accusing the local authority of grandstanding and issuing inaccurate road funds figures.

Mafume said the transfer of the vehicle licensing portfolio to the government entity thwarted the local authority’s efforts to take care of its road infrastructure.

““That is when the problems of failure to repair and maintain roads and the attendant infrastructure began and the results are visible on the ground for all to see,” he said.

Nkosinathi Ncube Chief Executive Officer of ZINARA responded to Harare Mayor Jacob Mafume’s statement blaming the roads administrator for short-changing council on road maintenance funds.

In his statement, ZINARA CEO said :

“Whilst we don’t want to respond to rhetoric, we feel duty bound to inform the nation with facts on certain inaccuracies.

“Firstly, we want to categorically state that, ZINARA has consistently disbursed funds for road rehabilitation and maintenance to all the Road Authorities, City of Harare included.

“According to the dictates of the Roads Act, a Road Authority can only access a new disbursement from Zinara after acquitting its previous disbursement,” he said.

He added that City of Harare was allocated 86 million ZWL in 2020 but the local authority failed to utilise the funds including that of 2022 fourth quarter disbursement.

” It could be translated using the prevailing exchange rate at the time and ZINARA disbursed 100 percent of that amount and the city of Harare failed to acquit their last disbursement.

” As a result, they failed to access an early disbursement in 2021. The City of Harare’s allocation for 2021 was 1, 3 billion which again can be translated to USD using the exchange rate at the time. However, the City of Harare only requested 154 million ZWL of this total allocation and failed to utilise in excess of 1, 1 billion ZWL.

“In 2022, they are yet to acquit their fourth quarter disbursement of 566 million ZWL despite the fact that most Road Authorities have already acquitted their 2022 disbursements. This means that even if funds were to be disbursed today as per the ZINARA schedule for 2023, Harare residents will still be deprived of service delivery until their Road Authority follows the dictates of the Road Act.