Marondera proposes $8m budget

Mash East Correspondent
Marondera municipality has maintained a static budget of $8 million for 2018, which it claims will be used to deliver consistent and reliable services. In an interview on Wednesday, chairperson of the finance committee Councillor Paul Masikati said the proposed budget for next year would meet set targets and achieve set goals.

“We have since forwarded the budget to the Ministry of Local Government, Public Works and National Housing for approval. In the interest of residents and ratepayers, we held extensive consultations and at the end of the day we came up with this static budget. An all stakeholders meeting was held late last month and each organisation had its input. That is why we came up with this $8 million budget,” he said. Cllr Masikati said council was ensuring that the number of debtors, which increased by 38 percent, would not continue to rise.

“It was noted that council should take steps to lease out the loss-making income-generating projects by the end of the first quarter. We have already put in place mechanisms to ensure that we follow on what we were advised by our parent ministry to do and we will be seeing results soon. At the end of the day, what we want to achieve is quality and consistent service delivery because that is what the residents and other ratepayers expect from this council,” he said.

Meanwhile, the local authority is owed $22 million by ratepayers. In a service delivery meeting held in August this year, the council’s finance director, Mr John Kachingwe, said the continued failure by ratepayers to service their bills was having a negative impact on service delivery. Mr Kachingwe said council had only managed to collect $1,3 million, which is 15 percent of the projected collections.