Councillors call for Harare City procurement probe

Nokuthula Dube

THE City of Harare is left with only four days’ worth of water treatment chemicals after the local authority awarded tenders for water treatment chemicals to companies that have yet to deliver them.

This was revealed at a full council meeting last week.

Irate councillors called for an immediate investigation of the whole procurement department.

They accused the unit of corruption and facilitating the awarding of contracts to inept companies that promised kickbacks.

Some members of the procurement department are currently before the courts on allegations of corruptly awarding a US$9 million streetlights tender to a company owned by incarcerated businessmen Mike Chimombe and Moses Mpofu.

At the full council meeting, councillors called for the entire procurement department to be disbanded over the scandal.

Councillor Denford Ngadziore said: “We are calling for the human resources committee to probe the procurement department as they offered a certain company a tender for chlorine, which has not been delivered, and it’s not the first time we have had an unresolved tender. We recently had a tender awarded for chairs and they were not delivered.

“We are heading to the SADC summit and you are telling us that there are no water chemicals, yet that tender was awarded. That is unheard of.”

Chairperson of the subcommittee on Town House renovations and beautification Councillor Jane Bingari accused the procurement department of dereliction of duty.

“They did not do anything to expedite purchase of the water chemicals. It appears they do not want progress and everything indicates that something fishy is going on. They delayed submitting their request to the Procurement Regulatory Authority of Zimbabwe, yet they knew this was a process that takes time,” she said.

“We want the human resources department to look into this matter and review the whole procurement department. If they are slackening on their duties to this extent, we will have to excuse all of them.”

Harare Mayor Cllr Jacob Mafume said he will support the investigation of the procurement department.

“It’s critical we do so. We need to improve our systems all round,” he told The Sunday Mail.