Online Reporter
Diana Nherera
Herald Reporter
HARARE Mayor Councillor Jacob Mafume has commended the Human Resources and Finance committees for eliminating the City of Harare’s employee salary backlog, describing the achievement as a major milestone for the local authority.
Speaking while chairing the 1949th Ordinary Council Meeting at Town House on Tuesday, Clr Mafume said the city had struggled for years to pay employees on time, with salary arrears at one point stretching to seven months.
He said the council has now cleared salary payments up to May and is on course to pay June salaries by July 15, bringing the local authority back onto a normal payment schedule.
“I want to commend the Human Resources Committee and the Finance Committee for this huge achievement,” he said.
“We have been chasing our tails for so many years, and I know this because I was the Human Resources Committee chair when I joined council in 2018. At that time, we ended up offering employee residential stands in lieu of their salaries because we could not catch up.
“So for us to have cleared May salaries and be in a position to pay June salaries by July 15 is highly commendable. It has taken us a long time to get here, and I applaud everyone who worked to make this possible.
“And we hope that we will be able to maintain that momentum and we will not go back. Once we are able to deal with the salaries timeously, we should then be able to move to the other areas of service delivery that we need to move and there won’t be excuses from anyone about issues relating to this,” he said.
