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Blessings Chidakwa Municipal Correspondent
Harare City Council has suspended town planner, Samuel Nyabezi, who is being implicated in a land allocation scam.

This follows the suspension of human resources director and former housing director Matthew Marara and 13 other employees for pocketing more than US$1 million from corrupt land deals in Kuwadzana.

Works director Engineer Zvenyika Chawatama yesterday confirmed the suspension of Nyabezi, saying he was under investigation for offences he allegedly committed in 2018 when he allocated stands to seekers without approval from council.

Nyabezi is alleged to have processed the stands layout plan without a works order from council’s evaluation and estates management as required by procedure.

He allegedly signed the plan without details of ownership of the land and details of the technician who did the layout plan.

“In so doing, he paved way for it to be submitted for stand numbering and further processing, leading to the stands being allocated to stand seekers,” said Eng Chawatama. “The stands created numbered 17323 to 17342.”

Eng Chawatama said the layout plan created by Nyabezi was not allocated a circulation reference and neither was it circulated to relevant sections as is required to ensure it did not interfere with infrastructure interests.

Harare Residents Trust director Mr Precious Shumba said: “All the council officials implicated in the abuse of power and authority and mismanagement of public resources should face disciplinary proceedings for bringing the council into disrepute.”