border staff village nears completion

Thupeyo Muleya, Beitbridge Bureau

THE Government staff village comprising 220 houses for civil servants and other State employees assigned to the Beitbridge Border Post is nearing completion, ensuring that those deployed there can do efficient work instead of spending their time looking for somewhere to live.

Civil servants and staff from agencies such as the Zimbabwe Revenue Authority tend to be rotated through Beitbridge on assignment of a few years at a time, so are not permanent residents of the town.

So like the police and increasingly like the health services, employer accommodation is needed to ensure this transient workforce has somewhere respectable and affordable to live.

Zimborders Consortium is building the village as part of its 17,5-year concession from the Government and those living in the houses will be assigned from the civil service, mainly the Department of Immigration, who check people entering and leaving Zimbabwe, and Zimra, who handle the assessment and collection of customs duties.

In the last decade, inefficiency issues had been mainly attributed to the shortage of accommodation for Government agencies and so most critical departments had to work with a lean staff.

However, the Second Republic led by President Mnangagwa and its partners secured US$300 million to transform the border post as part of the general policy of making it a lot easier to do business.

The revamp and major upgrade of the border post, already far advanced, has seen the Government providing the land and technical requirements, and Zimborders pumping in the required cash, being allowed to get its return on investment over 17,5 years of border toll fees before handing over the assets to the Government.

The consortium’s chief executive officer, Mr Francois Diedrechsen, said civil works on the housing section were one month ahead of schedule.

“The planned completion time is between February and March (approximately one month ahead of schedule) and civil works are at varying stages,” he said.

Mr Diedrechsen said some houses are getting their final finishes while others were still under construction, pretty much what happens in any housing development.

The clubhouse area has also been prepped and work has commenced in that area.
Power, sewer and water reticulation services connections have been installed on some properties although not active pending the completion of major civil works.

“Unfortunately, I don’t have the accurate spent amounts at hand but what I am certain about is that we have used 80 percent of the budget for the housing development section,” said Mr Diedrechsen.

He said they were expecting civil works to up the tempo when the construction industry re-opens next week following an annual shut down effected in December.

Mr Diedrechsen said the border transformation had the in-port and out-of-port component and that most of these were on track for completion.

In port projects were done in three phases and have all been completed, and include the freight, bus and light vehicles terminals and the Zimborders Maintenance offices, a fire suppression system, upgrading of roads among others.

So far, a new state-of-the-art fire station and the sewer oxidation dam have been completed and handed over to the Government for further management. Workers are now putting final touches to the 11,4 mega litres water reservoir and animal and plant quarantine centre.