adminThe organisation held an emergency annual general meeting at Freedom House in Mzilikazi recently, where members agreed that the congress would be hosted by the Bulawayo branch.
The NCDPZ has not had an elected leadership for some time and has been led by an interim committee of which Mr Obadiah Moyo is the president.
There has been friction between Mr Moyo’s leadership and the previous president Mrs Fungai Cherera and the matter spilt to the courts after the latter “illegally” closed offices to block the other faction from accessing them.
The AGM was necessitated by a recent Supreme Court ruling in Bulawayo by Deputy Chief Judge, Justice Luke Malaba that the committee had outlived its term of office and now illegal hence the need for an elective congress to solve the crisis at hand.
On Saturday the members agreed to hold the congress in Bulawayo in July in terms of Section 7 of the NCDPZ Constitution, which specifies that a congress should be called every four years where a president should be elected. Nominations should be called for at least six months before the day of the congress.
It emerged at the AGM that title deeds to the council’s assets namely Freedom House, a supermarket in Emakhandeni and a house in Newton West were being withheld by the other faction while five vehicles had gone missing.
The AGM resolved that all assets be returned, as members resolved to sell the house and reclaim the supermarket.
They demanded to know how the name of the supermarket had been changed to Basic Supermarket.
“We have written to Mrs Cherera to return all the assets and account for all the money she took. We are waiting for her response. Audited accounts showed that she had been withdrawing money regularly, but there are no receipts to that effect while some funds are locked in banks and she is refusing to countersign as the signatory,” said the acting executive director Mr Leonard Marange.
The audited accounts statement presented by the treasurer, Mr Joseph Ndebele showed that the signatories to the missing money and assets were Mrs Cherera, the late Mr Alexander Phiri and another, who also sold vehicles without engaging expert valuators.
“The organisation has no money at all, but we are glad that we now have the audited accounts, which will help us find a way forward in terms of assets,” said Mr Ndebele.
Said Mr Moyo: “We have title deeds to the assets, but we do not know where they are. Five vehicles are missing. They are just recorded in books and we will take some measures. We also need to sell the old vehicles before they completely lose value. The house is now dilapidated and the people staying there are not paying any bills and very soon it might be auctioned by service providers. It is proper that we sell it and use the money to refurbish Freedom House and run the supermarket, as income generating projects.”
“We were failing to raise $5 000 required by the lawyers for our case to go to the Supreme Court, but Justice Malaba struck the application off the roll without costs and told the lawyers that there was no way we could raise that money. He went on to deal with the matter saying that the High Court judge had erred and ruled that the term of office for the elected committee had ended in 2007 and the current interim committee is illegal hence the need for us to go to an elective congress.
“The court case was not about who should lead the organisation, but was about the offices that had been illegally closed by the Mrs Cherera’s faction.
The supermarket was initially meant to provide members with employment but no disabled person was working there.”
The power wrangle between the two factions has caused the faction led by Mrs Cherera to deny access to members to use offices in Kwekwe and had blocked an agricultural project in Beitbridge, as punishment to those, who refused to join the faction.
Members suggested that people with a vision should be elected into office and feared the events would scare away donors.
Online Reporter