The Combined Harare Residents Association (CHRA) claims that the local authority is losing thousands of dollars in potential revenue due to council workers who are allegedly accepting bribes to manipulate bills for personal benefit.
CHRA president Mfundo Mlilo says the council’s BIQ accounting system is easy to manipulate as payments are mostly done manually by city workers that are suspected to be taking bribes from locals to reduce bills.
According to Mlilo, his organization has been pushing the council to use a centralized bill payment system utilizing modern information communication technology, including mobile phones.
He says Harare and other cities can take advantage of Zimbabwe’s mobile phone device penetration of more than 13 million, to curb such activities resulting in councils generating a lot of revenue.
Harare mayor Bernard Manyenyeni was not available for comment as he was not responding to calls on his mobile phone. But Ward 13 Councillor Peter Moyo confirmed that the city council is losing thousands of dollars through the manipulation of the BIQ accounting system by council workers.