Emgwanini Councillor Mpumelelo Moyo has taken a swipe at the Director of the Health Services Department, Dr Edwin Sibanda-Mzingwane, for allegedly delaying responding to donors who wanted to donate resources to a clinic in his ward.
Cllr Moyo registered his displeasure during a full council meeting, Wednesday, where he called out Dr Sibanda and accused him of sleeping on duty.
Cllr Moyo said the same donors indicated that this is not the first time they have encountered a similar challenge while trying to donate to council clinics.
“I would like to express my disappointment, there are some donors that I brought to the council. They asked for a written communication citing that as the council we are in agreement that they can donate to Emganwini clinic. It was quite disappointing that I had to make a follow-up several times on the matter. It took me two to three weeks to get communication from the Director of Health. I ended up having to call the Town Clerk to get the letter. Someone clearly slept on their duty,” Cllr Moyo fumed.
“In a meeting that we had with the donors, they indicated that there are more people who are willing to have those donations so if we are not going to respond in time, they will take their donations elsewhere. They said that such had happened again in the past where they wanted to donate something to the council, but they ended up not doing so because the requested letters did not get the letters on time.”
Cllr Moyo said that at times people want to assist but the conduct of certain council staff turns them away.
“We understand that council does not have money and we find people who want to help us then you have a director who can’t even write a letter to say to the donor we do need the help! It is so painful. We will be doing a disservice to the people. I’m not happy with what happened. I hope that this is the last time that such happens that when we bring in donors, they are treated like this. It is very unprofessional.”
Cllr Silas Chigora also weighed in, stating that similar treatment was given to some investors who wanted to put up streetlights city-wide.
“I do remember that sometime back when we had just begun our term, there was an investor who wanted to light up the whole city with streetlights. That person never got a response. It would be prudent for the relevant departments to give us a report of why that never materialised. This is a disservice to the people,” Cllr Chigora said.
Acting Mayor, Cllr Mlandu Ncube emphasised that council management have to act swiftly when donors express interest in supporting council.
“We are all aware that we are a local government and I think we should make available our donation policy that we adopted. It must be made public so that those who wish to donate can have knowledge of it. We must respond to such issues swiftly,” Cllr Ncube said.
“When someone wants to give us resources, we can’t take two weeks to respond. When donors approach us as council, we should be swift in responding. We give them our donation policy, so that should there be corrections people can correct where they might be wrong because at the end of the day the people of Bulawayo must benefit. What we do not want are donations that have conditions and attachments.”
