In a major development, five rural villages that are within Bulawayo City Council’s boundaries will this year benefit from the upgrading of a secondary school and the setting up of a modern water reticulation system, which will be funded through the local authority’s ward retention fund following outcries about neglect.
Inhabitants of St Peters, Robert Sinyoka, Mazwi, Hyde Park Estate and Methodist villages whose areas fall under Bulawayo’s Ward 17 in Pumula Constituency have been complaining about the glaring rural and urban divide despite the fact that they pay rates to the local authority.
A 2024 investigation by CITE in collaboration with the Information for Development Trust (IDT), a non-profit media organisation promoting investigative journalism in Zimbabwe and the SADC region, exposed the neglect of the villages.
READ: https://cite.org.zw/perpetual-outcasts-the-plight-of-bulawayo-villages-reeling-from-neglect/
The 602 households in the five villages have no primary health care facilities, access to running water is limited and their only secondary school has two classroom blocks and lacks modern education infrastructure such as laboratories as well as information communication technology learning centres.
A close scrutiny of the council’s 2025 budget revealed that plans are afoot to build staff cottages, classroom blocks and a science laboratory at Sizalendaba Secondary School after years of lobbying.
Part of the funds would be used to set up community taps in St Peters to ensure that the villagers have access to running water.
According to information obtained from council, the Ward 17 retention account had ZiG 633 591 and US22 272 as of November 2024, which will be partly used to fund the two major projects.
Council introduced the ward retention fund in 2016 following calls for wards to retain a percentage of revenue collected on rates paid by residents to support some of the developmental projects at the local level.
It allows the local community and its leadership to be involved in the selection and implementation of projects at ward level, which is seen as a form of empowerment.
The three percent ward fund does not include revenue from the water levy, money collected for Value Added Tax purposes, government and parastatal set-offs as well as grants, loans or other forms of support being given to council.
Priority projects
Nesisa Mpofu, the council spokesperson, confirmed that the upgrading of Sizalendaba Secondardy School and the development of the Khami water reticulation scheme to service St Peters will be prioritised this year under the ward retention fund.
“There is the proposed construction of Sizalendaba Secondary School in the 2025 budget,” Mpofu said.
“The community is partially serviced through the use of community taps. There is a proposed ward retention project to do water reticulation, which will cover the area towards Khami as it is currently not covered.
“Water kiosks could be established as an immediate relief to surrounding communities. “Donor engagement to assist in drilling of boreholes in the area can be considered.”
Zvenyika Murapa Moyo, the Mazwi village development chairperson, said the community had waited for more than 12 years for the development of the school to acceptable standards.
“There were a lot of empty promises in the last 12 years,” Moyo said. “The school only has two classroom blocks, which were built by the community and they were handed over to council.
“The school cannot offer science subjects because there are no laboratories and every year we were being told something had been allocated for the school in the council budget.”
Sizalendaba Secondary School was set up by the community with support from non-governmental organisations (NGOs).
Local leaders said donors were the only ones that seemed interested in the development of the five villages.
World Vision, one of the NGOs that was supporting the Robert Sinyoka community with development programmes targeted especially at children and “offering relief to elders in the village” for 23 years, pulled out on August 7, 2024, council documents showed.
The humanitarian organisation constructed two teachers’ cottages at St Peters Primary School to curb the problem of high staff turnover.
Currency instability
Water 17 councillor Sikhululekile Moyo said currency instability was disrupting development plans for the villages as money allocated under the ward retention fund tends to lose value before it is utilised.
She said last year they used some of the money to upgrade a community hall on the urban part of the ward and development of the Pumula North recreation grounds.
Mpofu said council was struggling to finance the development of infrastructure due to the poor performance of the economy as she acknowledged the need to develop primary health centres to service the villagers, who have to walk several kilometres to the nearest clinic in Pumula.
“The ideal situation is that there should be a health facility for every 10 000 people and ideally within 5km, which is considered a walking distance,” she told CITE.
“Unfortunately, the said population is supposed to be catered for via outreach programmes as it is below the threshold (population), but sadly beyond 5km.”
Mpofu disputed assertions by community leaders and residents associations that there were no adequate consultations on development priorities.
“Ward retention projects are decided upon in consultation with the respective communities through the ward councillor,” she said.
“Meetings are held where residents bring forward proposed projects for consideration.
“The listed projects are categorised and prioritised for implementation depending on the community’s priority list and available finances
“The effectiveness depends on the payments of the particular ward as projects proposed and conducted depend on the ward’s financial payments.
“The effectiveness is also dependent on the ward development committee.”
Recalls hamper development
Sichelesile Mahlangu, the Pumula Constituency Member of Parliament from the opposition Citizens Coalition for Change (CCC) , said constant recalls of elected representatives and currency instability was impeding the effective use of the Constituency Development (CDF).
Pumula has been under control of the opposition MDC, MDC Alliance and now CCC since the year 2000.
Since the CDF was introduced in 2010 there have been three recalls of MPs representing the constituency because of perennial squabbles afflicting the opposition.
The government introduced the CDF in 2010 to enable legislators to spearhead development projects in their constituencies.
MPs get up to the equivalent of US$50 000 year from the CDF, but the scheme has over the years been disrupted by Zimbabwe’s currency problems.
The allocations, which are often in local currency, are disbursed late to an extent that by the time they become available to the constituency the money would have lost value significantly.
In April the country switched to the Zimbabwe Gold (ZiG) from the RTGS dollar after the local currency was battered by inflation. This was despite the fact that this year’s national budget was crafted in RTGS.
Zimbabwe has been battling currency instability since 2008 when it dumped the inflation ravaged local currency in favour of multi-currencies dominated by the US dollar.
The local unit was reintroduced in 2019, but it has struggled to find its footing on the market.
Over the years, legislators have been pushing the government to disburse the CDF money in US dollars after service providers rejected the unstable local currency.
