THE government, for a very long time, has been appointing commissions of inquiry to handle several probes.
These commissions are appointed by none other than the highest office in the land — the President of the Republic.
Appointed by President Emmerson Mnangagwa in May last year, the Commission of Inquiry into Governance Issues around Harare City Council and led by retired High Court judge Justice Maphios Cheda followed complaints about deteriorating service delivery in the capital city.
At the time, Justice Cheda summed up the operations at Harare City Council saying: “There were too many dirty hands in the cookie jar. Too many dirty hands in the cookie jar. They are still there”.
The Commission’s mandate was meant to probe key governance issues at the City of Harare, including graft allegations.
It was also established to investigate reports of mismanagement and financial misconduct at the country’s largest local authority.
During its investigations, the Commission also unearthed the obscene salaries and perks that executives at Town House were pocketing, all this at the expense of service delivery, which is deteriorating at an alarming pace.
The Commission’s report was handed over to Mnangagwa in June this year.
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However, up to now, the government has not uttered a word save for Local Government and Public Works minister Daniel Garwe’s confirmation that the rot was not peculiar to Harare, promising to ensure similar probes were cascaded to other local authorities across the country.
Harare, like other urban local authorities around Zimbabwe, has reportedly failed to ensure a consistent supply of potable water to residents while its waste management is in a shambles.
This failure, or rather delay, in acting by the government, has led to several theories emerging, with most people saying this is yet another example where the government has displayed its weakness in following through on graft cases.
They say this may be because top officials might be complicit in the rot.
There have been several reports of embezzlement as well as property and land grabs at Town House, evidence of systemic rot and entrenched graft and institutional collapse which can also be found in other local authorities across Zimbabwe.
Some state-owned enterprises have reportedly found themselves on the brink of collapse owing to mismanagement, brazen theft and wanton pulverisation among many other vices by authorities and those entrusted with leading the firms.
Yet the voice of citizens, who are the real owners of the enterprises have somewhat been silenced in calculated maneouvres to keep the rot under the carpet.
Garwe must now honour his promise and urgently take the probe to local authorities across the country. This is the only way to clear up the systemic corruption.
But first, Mnangagwa must make the Harare findings public. There is no justification for conducting expensive investigations only to conceal their results from the taxpayers who funded them.
