THE commission of inquiry looking into the operations of Harare City Council yesterday heard that councillors at Town House are interfering in land allocation processes.
In May this year, President Emmerson Mnangagwa appointed the commission to investigate the operations of the City of Harare regarding financial management issues dating back to 2017.
The commission heard that in the past five years, councillors were allocated and bought land which was not in their own wards.
The commission also heard that individual councillors, mainly from the opposition parties, were dictating who should get land, yet it should be the preserve of the full council.
It was further indicated that most beneficiaries of land allocation were people who were not on the housing waiting list, with the councillors accused of receiving kickbacks from the sale of the land.
Appearing before the commission yesterday, Harare director of housing and social services Addmore Nhekairo said when it came to land regularisation, a full council makes the decision.
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“About the land in Warren Park, a full council made that resolution. Can I assist in the resolution which seeks to regularise 144 sites after the regularisation taskforce visits the area?
“It was a joint committee of housing committee, finance committee and the environmental management committee in city council.
“Now, it would not be wrong to say that this process replicated itself or has been replicated by council on all the situations that are on that way,” Nhekairo said.
The commission indicated that the activity had naturally destabilised the functions of the city and Nhekairo was asked what he did to stop the illegal allocation of land.
“Firstly, whenever a grouping of people applies, we say that is not the process that we want,” he said.
“It is the absence of hard evidence to present that what we have done is to make sure that such instances are eliminated.
“Secondly, wherever there are invasions, we have empowered the district officer to report to the nearest police station. It’s true, I’ve never been in support of regularisation.”