Staff village brings relief to border agencies

THE construction of 220 housing units for Government workers as part of the US$300 million Beitbridge Border modernisation project has come as a relief for most border agencies who had in the last two decades endured perennial accommodation woes.

Prior to the latest development, most Government agencies at the border had challenges deploying a full staff complement thereby compromising service delivery.

The staff village which comprises 220 houses was built through a partnership between the Government and the Zimborders Consortium.

Housing development, an animal plant and quarantine facility, a new fire station, a new sewer oxidation dam, and a new water reservoir with a carrying capacity of 11, 4 mega litres are part of the out-of-port works under the transformation project.

Most of the projects have been completed while Zimborders is expected to wrap up the whole project this month.

The consortium handed over the housing units to the Government in March and the occupants moved into the new facilities at the beginning of this month.

During the last decade, inefficiency issues had been mainly attributed to the shortage of accommodation for Government agencies.

As a result, most critical departments had to work with lean staff.

“As the Department of Immigration, we applaud the Government for the border transformation that has also come with the housing development initiative,” said the Regional Immigration Officer-in-charge of Beitbridge, Mr Joshua Chibundu.

“It is pleasing to note that most of the immigration officers highly appreciate the decent receipt of good houses.

“The availability of more housing units has resulted in most officers living in a full house, thus enabling them to house their families as opposed to the previous setup whereby three officers shared one house.”

He continued; “After a full day of hard work, they naturally need decent accommodation to relax in preparation for the next day’s work. Hands up to the Government for considering our plight”.

The official added that a situation where some immigration officers used to share accommodation deprived them of privacy and adequately desired rest after a day’s work.

Mr Chibundu said although they still had a few officers sharing accommodation, their operational challenges had largely been fixed.

He said they had also requested their employer to deploy more workers to Beitbridge to match the border transformation.

The police officer commanding Beitbridge district (Dispol), Chief Superintendent Tichaona Nyongo said: “We appreciate the efforts by our Government to solve some of our challenges. Rome was not built in a day. The small number that benefitted is actually riding on cloud nine.”

Beitbridge Border Post’s Head of agriculture plant inspectorate, Mr Levi Gama said they had managed to beef up staff following the availability of more accommodation facilities.

He said most workers had secured houses, a setup that has boosted their morale.

“It was a relief for us considering that the officers are now separated from the landlords who at times were their clients and thus issues of bias are being eradicated where enforcement of regulations is concerned,” said Mr Gama.

Beitbridge Mayor, Councillor Munyaradzi Chitsunge commended the Government recently for uplifting the face of the border town.

He said the new staff village was an important infrastructure development project that fits into the local authority’s transformation drive.

Cllr Chitsunge said they were grateful for the enhanced service delivery capacity and that they were now able to address water, sewer and waste management following the completion of the 11,4 mega litres reservoir and a new sewer oxidation dam.

“The border modernisation project has changed the face of Beitbridge and we are now able to provide other critical services. We now have a new fire station, houses for Government workers, a new water reservoir and a new look border which have changed the face of our town,” said the mayor.

The new staff village has 20 Type A houses for heads of departments with three bedrooms detached units and (Type B) 20 others with three bedrooms and are semi-detached.

The remaining (Type C) 180 units mostly densified (high-rise flats) with two bedrooms will be shared by a total of 180 junior staff members.

The houses were built in the form of a gated complex with an independent sewer system comprising a bio-digester.

In addition, the housing complex has a clubhouse with a swimming pool, braai area, and numerous playing areas for children which dovetails with the social amenities dimension project. — @tupeyo