Search begins for new BCC town clerk

Auxilia Katongomara Chronicle Reporter
THE BULAWAYO City Council will next week begin searching for a substantive town clerk following the death of Middleton Nyoni in September this year. In an interview, Bulawayo mayor, Councillor Martin Moyo said the city had already started drafting the advertisements for council’s top job. “We would soon be beginning the search for the town clerk as we’re working on the advertisements. They would be flighted in the first week of January in various media publications,” said Clr Moyo.

Nyoni had been the city’s town clerk for six years since 2009.

He said the advertisements would run for a minimum of two weeks after which applications from prospective candidates would be short-listed for interviews.

Moyo said shortlisted candidates would then be invited to attend interviews where the best, second and third best candidates would be picked and their names will then be sent to the Local Government Board for selection and appointment.

The city’s chamber secretary, Sikhangele Zhou, has been acting town clerk since August last year, as Nyoni who had been battling a cancer related illness was on an indefinite sick leave.

The country’s two largest cities of Harare and Bulawayo have been operating without substantive town clerks following the death of Nyoni and sacking of Tendai Mahachi as the capital’s chief administrator.

The Harare City council fired Mahachi on three months’ notice in August this year following his demand for $3m as an exit package, which was turned down.

The council, however, offered the ousted chief executive officer a $150,000 retirement package.

The search for the town clerk has been mired in controversy as Harare City councillors accused Mayor Bernard Manyenyeni of not following laid down procedure in flighting the advertisements.

The majority of councillors felt the adverts were flawed and had a lot of irregularities as the advert cites the post as Town Clerk Designate and the argument is that the position of Town Clerk Designate does not exist in the Urban Councils Act.

They also argued that the age of the candidate being searched for was not stated in the advert as well.

The deadline for emailing the applications was Friday December 4.