Council slashes bills

In an interview, the council’s finance director, Mr Edgar Mwedzi said the 20 percent reduction of bills would only be effective for a month after which defaulters would be handed over to debt collectors.
“The 20 percent discount on bills will only run until the end of March 2012. This is sort of a promotion meant to help us recover what we are owed by ratepayers. We are saying as council that our clients whose bills were not cleared by 31 December 2011, should utilise this chance and clear their debts to avoid being handed over to the council debt collectors,” he said.
Mr Mwedzi said residents, industry and commerce owed the council more than $10 million in unpaid bills.
“The rate at which our clients have been paying their bills since the introduction of the multi-currency system is so pathetic. Right now the council is owed over $10 million in unpaid bills. This is what we are trying to recover by slashing every bill by 20 percent so as to urge the residents to clear their bills,” he said.
Mr Mwedzi said the local authority was in the process of compiling names of those who owed the council with the aim of handing them over to debt  collectors.
“This is the last chance we are giving our clients to clear their bills. Those who would still owe the council by 31 March would be handed over to legal practitioners in order for us to recover the money by 1 April 2012,” he said.
Mr Mwedzi said those who would have failed to clear their bills within the stipulated period should visit the Town House with a payment plan to avoid their property being attached.
Gweru City Council has been struggling to deliver quality  services with water shortage being the major challenge haunting residents for the past two years.
The city council authorities are on record citing high rate of defaulting as the reason for failing to deliver.