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Government is walking the talk on corruption, witness a series of arrests that have been made lately.

Last week, officials from Chitungwiza Municipality were picked up to answer to a litany of allegations levelled against them.

Whether the said individuals would be found guilty or not lies with the courts, but the nation takes solace in the strides Government is taking to rid society of inept, greedy and criminal elements that are running both private and public institutions.

As media, we have previously voiced concern about the rot that has characterised operations in local authorities and regarding poor corporate governance and corruption.

With little or nothing to show for the money they are collecting from ratepayers, the majority of MDC-Alliance-run urban local authorities have dismally failed to deliver basic services to residents.

Councils are failing to provide basic services like water, waste management and maintenance of sewer services, but instead spending time on self-enriching corrupt services, that resulted in the arrest of Chitungwiza council officials last week.

The deplorable state of affairs in the town, where residential places have mushroomed everywhere, and in some instances, a stone throw away from the faecal Manyame Rivers, merely points to a failed management system that long relegated its mandate and is now focusing on surreptitious and clandestine activities.

It is a fact that land barons have wreaked havoc in Chitungwiza since 2010, creating a parallel land authority, that today still stands with its own architects, town planners building inspectors and housing officers.

In 2017, a Parliamentary Portfolio Committee on Local Government led by Irene Zindi tabled a report to Parly, which revealed that the land barons were allocating people land on wetlands, illegally subdivided and allocated State land.

The committee further revealed that some of the land that was illegally sold to unsuspecting home seekers was on top of sewer pipes, electricity pylons, as well as sites meant for roads, schools, clinics and recreational facilities.

As a result of the illegal allocations by the land barons, several people lost thousands of dollars after being swindled of their hard-earned cash.

These are some of the problems bedevilling Chitungwiza, hence the Government’s decision to arrest some of the council officials, who are being implicated in such shoddy deals.

We are optimistic that due diligence would be done to ensure that those found on the wrong side of the law, will get deterring sentences, to send a strong warning that corruption has no place in the Second Republic.

Investigators need to be thorough and meticulous, ensuring that they comb every aspect of their cases to leave no stone unturned.

Solid and watertight cases take time to conclude and investigators need not rush as the risk of presenting half-baked cases with no chance of succeeding in court is real.

They already have the support of the highest office in the land because President Mnangagwa has from onset made it clear that he is pushing for zero-tolerance against corruption, and will deal incisively with those found on the wrong side of the law.

We believe problems facing Chitungwiza have long been duplicated to other local authorities and councils, a development which calls for further investigations into their activities.

Local authorities and councils should be investigated and be made accountable of some of the decisions they made which still haunt Government to this day.

Harare South Constituency, is one such area, where land barons created chaos on State land, resulting in a lot of informal settlements that are causing the Government officials sleepless nights in the manner the settlements sprouted from nowhere.

It defies the logic, how such a huge settlement like Hopley ended up with thousands of occupants, on un-serviced land, where there is no single tap of water, let alone a solitary sewer line.

At this juncture we believe the time is nigh for the activities of local authorities and councils to go under public scrutiny, to safeguard ratepayers interests.

We therefore call upon the Zimbabwe Anti-Corruption Commission and the police to heighten its interest on local authorities which, over the years, have become fodders for corruption across, especially on illegal land allocation and activities.

Towns are the face of Zimbabwe, so surely no investor would want to come and invest in cities where the land usage is haphazard, with some unreasonable local authorities’ officials dipping their hands in the very same cookie jar they should be safeguarding.