adminThupeyo Muleya Beitbridge Bureau
An acute shortage of resources, among them vehicles, hit-tech equipment and accommodation for border officials is crippling operations and Government’s efforts to curb illegal migration and intrusive leakages at the country’s border with South Africa.
The Parliamentary Portfolio Committee on Defence, Security and Home Affairs heard this during a tour to assess conformity with international operations standards at Beitbridge and Forbes border posts at the weekend.
The parliamentarians toured Beitbridge on Friday before proceeding to Forbes in Mutare on Saturday.
Committee chairperson Retired Brigadier-General Levy Mayihlome said although the border units were facing a litany of challenges affecting service delivery, they were pleased with their work ethics and passion to deliver under difficult circumstances.
“We are here to check on how our border control units, mostly immigration and the police are conforming to set standards and what challenges they are having which need our attention,” he said.
“The issues will be sorted in piecemeal in order of priorities.
“We have noted that these men and women charged with manning our borders have the zeal and passion to serve and as Government we need to complement such efforts by capacitating them. From the challenges on the ground, it is apparent that the border authorities and the security agents working along the boundary line should be motivated to save without being susceptible to taking bribes.
“We need to revisit the issues of travel and subsistence (T and S) for those men and women charged with enhancing security and curbing intrusive leakages along our borders.
“This should be looked at as a matter of urgency. The other issue we need to urgently look at is the deployment of vehicles to enhance border patrols among other crime prevention initiatives in this area. As it stands, they are crippled.”
Rtd Brig-Gen Mayihlome said it was time Government modernised operations at the port of entries in line with international trends.
He said the security and accommodation shortages for border officials was another cause for concern.
“We need to go hi-tech in our quest to reduce crime at the borders in the form of drones, closed circuit televisions cameras so that authorities here may effectively cover the border line,” said Rtd Brig-Gen Mayihlome.
“We cannot have a situation where people patrol on foot, that is laborious. In addition, we need barriers at this border to control the movement of both human and cargo. The barriers can help control and monitor genuine travellers from criminals. As it stands, the border is porous.”
Rtd brig Gen-Mayihlome said they were optimistic that the ongoing border modernisation programme at Beitbridge would go a long way in minimising service delivery challenges at the country’s and SADC’s busiest in land port of entry.
He said they were also disturbed by reports of an upsurge in the smuggling of prohibited substances, among them drugs between Zimbabwe and South Africa.
Online Reporter