adminThupeyo Muleya
THE Local Government Board has appointed Mr Loud Ramakgapola as the substantive town secretary for Beitbridge to replace Dr Sipho Singo who died in January this year.
The appointment is with effect from 21 October.
Prior to Mr Ramakgapola’s appointment, the district administrator, Mr Simon Muleya, has been acting in that capacity.
The new council boss once served as an acting district administrator for Beitbridge between 1998 and 2006 before joining Datlabs as a human resources officer in June 2006.
He later joined Alpha Media Holdings as the group human resources manager between 2008 and 2013.
In February this year he joined the Zimbabwe Mail as its human resources manager before joining the Gokwe local authority as town secretary.
He holds a Master’s Degree in Public Administration, degree in Political Administration, diploma in Personnel Management and is also studying towards a diploma in Labour Relations with the University of Zimbabwe.
In an interview yesterday, Mr Ramakgapola said his immediate task was to transform Beitbridge into a modern urban centre and also bring back the confidence of rate payers in terms of service delivery.
“The motivation is to see Beitbridge developing into an urban centre by addressing some of the elements making it rural. “We need proper management of domestic animals, illegal vending, tree management, cleaning up of the town.
“It is very important that we attend to issues of environment and waste management, health and education. We have a lot of litter around the town and hence we need to engage in more anti-litter campaigns since Beitbridge’s population is mainly transitory.
“Further our dumpsite should meet the Environment Management Agency standards,” he said.
Mr Ramakgapola said during his tenure he would spearhead the establishment of properly designated vending places for women and the youth. He said vendors would be properly licensed rather than playing cat and mouse with police.
He added that it was important for the local authority to build its own fire station rather than relying on Gwanda and Musina Municipality in South Africa in case of emergencies.
“Beitbridge border town is the preface of the country and hence this calls for us to focus more on giving the area a facelift. It is also important for council programmes to be in sync with border operations as Beitbridge is the busiest port of entry in Southern Africa.
“We need to mobilise more resources so that we can be able to set up a modern bus terminus. At the moment we don’t have proper facilities, what we have is just a ground.
“Our programmes should be in tandem with the Zim-Asset and we need to start by improving social services through establishing more council schools, clinics, tower lights, a police post and recreational parks for both children and adults across the town.
“Currently these services are concentrated on the southern part of the town, yet the area is developing rapidly on the northern side,” said Mr Ramakgapola. Mr Ramakgapola said the local authority was open to public private partnerships with other development players adding that these would boost infrastructural development.
“As a people oriented local authority we need to continue engaging residents, local political leaders, businessmen and other stakeholders in all our programmes. We are going to work with Zinwa in ensuring that we have a constant supply of water in the town,” he said.
Online Reporter