adminKennedy Mavhumashava
UP to 22 000 Bulawayo residents, among them civil servants, may have lost huge sums of money after they were duped into buying illegally-acquired residential stands from two government officials working with 12 private land developers in Upper Rangemore.The two officials — one of whom worked for Umguza Rural District Council as a planning officer and another at the Ministry of Local Government, Public Works and National Housing provincial planning office in Bulawayo — allegedly connived with the private developers who sold the stands.
The officers also issued them with fake subdivision permits in a scam in which the duo and the developers may have pocketed millions. Efforts to contact both officials (names withheld) failed yesterday.
A number of high-profile institutions including the Zimbabwe Teachers’ Union, Kango, National University of Science and Technology, Pretoria Portland Cement and Zimbabwe National Family Planning Council assisted some of their workers to buy stands in what is likely to turn out to be one of the biggest housing swindles in Bulawayo.
Umguza Rural District Council chief executive officer, Mr Collen Moyo said the Government had set up a team of three senior officials, headed by Matabeleland South Provincial Administrator, Mr Midard Khumalo to probe the suspected rip-off.
The Criminal Investigations Department is also investigating the possibility of fraud.
“All property development in Rangemore has been stopped because there were irregular allocations,” said Mr Moyo.
“There are two officials, one who worked for us and another who works or worked in the provincial physical planning office who were giving fake subdivision permits in Upper Rangemore. We are talking about around 22 000 stands, 12 land developers and a lot of money, millions.
Basically all the development in Upper Rangemore is fake and has been stopped. It is sad that unsuspecting home-seekers have been duped. No housing development can take place in Upper Rangemore without us involved. We are the local authority so anything being done without us is unprocedural.”
Administratively, Upper Rangemore is in Umguza District but is situated just west of Emganwini high density suburb. The area, which is covered under the Bulawayo master plan, has seen a lot of activity in recent years as residents took advantage of the availability of stands to build homes.
However, said Mr Moyo, much of it is illegal.
Terms differed from one developer to another and land size, but a source yesterday said interested teachers were made to pay a deposit of $600 and pay monthly installments towards the purchase and servicing of the mainly 200 square metre stands whose price averaged $3 000.
At Nust, 162 non-academic staff are arguing over $100 000 which they had contributed towards buying stands and servicing of the stands from one of the developers. Each of them contributed $100 monthly.
Nust has distanced itself as an institution from the case, saying only the developer — Zimbabwe Housing Projects Trust — has information on the whereabouts of the money.
The trust insists its work is above board. An official said last night that they had valid documents to carry out work but they held a meeting with officials from Umguza Rural District Council yesterday at which they resubmitted some of their papers.
“I think they are doing an audit or something. We met them today. We already had our papers but we resubmitted them. But I can confirm that we have not been stopped from developing our stands there,” she said.
Mr Moyo said his former subordinate resigned with immediate effect on 31 May, thus foregoing his benefits after he learnt that his activities had been unearthed.
“We have been ordered to send each of the 20 000 or so victims of the scam prohibition orders,” he said.
“It is a very expensive exercise writing to each of them but we have to do it. We are dealing with many supposedly enlightened institutions which fell prey to this.
We did a land audit in May and came up with a report outlining the irregularities. When the report was being presented, he (his former subordinate) was there but did not anticipate it would nail him. He was so shaken that he never left his seat for the 10 hours or so when we discussed the report.”
Mr Moyo said the land transactions in Upper Rangemore appeared genuine because the provincial physical planning office is the appropriate authority to give subdivision permits, but the officer who gave them had no official mandate to do so as some procedures and processes were flouted.
A Chronicle news crew visited Upper Rangemore late yesterday afternoon. There was no activity in the area with many housing units at foundation level and deserted.
Mr Khumalo, who is working with two provincial planning officers from the Midlands and Manicaland, declined to give details on the investigations.
“I can’t comment on that one now. You are aware that there are formalities involved. You don’t discuss such matters openly. Give us time; the findings will come out at the appropriate time. Let’s wait,” he said yesterday.
Online Reporter