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Municipal Reporter
Harare City Council is owed $380 million by its clients who include Government, satellite towns, businesses and residents, a situation the city claims is hampering service delivery.

Speaking during a budget consultative meeting with the business community on Monday, the city’s finance director, Mr Justin Mandizha, said residents in high-density areas owed the city about $82 million, low-density residents $140 million and Government and parastatals about $11 mil- lion.

Chitungwiza and Norton owe $4 million and $1,5 million, respectively.

The city also owes service providers $171 million.

“The cash flow crunch on the city has compromised preparedness to meet obligations; staffing rationalisation is also draining resources although it will pay dividends in the future,” said Mr Mandizha.

“The city also has limited capability to implement programmes. There is need to retool and procure new equipment. This has compromised service delivery and will continue to affect service delivery.”

Harare mayor councillor Bernard Manyenyeni said residents had to settle their bills for council to provide quality service.

“The city requires that rate payers play their part,” he said. “The crisis of under collection can be interpreted to mean that our residents are not prepared to pay for what we are planning to do for them.

“We survive on what we call, “eat what you kill basis”. It is only what you can bring in our coffers that we can avail as outlay for service delivery.”

Clr Manyenyeni said council had to use available resources wisely.

“Our collection decisions and spending decisions must mirror your thoughts and expectations,” he said. “None of our expenses should embarrass us, none of our expenses should be secret and none of our expenses should be private.

“We are in this job on behalf of the wider city. Regrettably, the human resources cost remain our greatest cost item. Efforts have been underway for the past year and a half to reduce our HR costs through various moves and measures.”