Centre News Hub.
Masvingo City council says it has not received a cent from the devolution funds this year despite the year coming to an end, a situation that has negatively impacted the provision of service delivery on projects funded by the programme.
Masvingo Mayor Clr Aleck Tabe confirmed in an interview that the delay is affecting progress in improving service delivery.
“No council has not yet received its 2025 disbursement of devolution funds” Mayor Tabe said in a brief response.
He lamented that the late disbursement is affecting the local authority in many ways as it is included in their annual budgets leading to clashes with residents when they undertake budget consultative meetings where they are asked why projects are stalling when they get devolution funds from government.
The same questions haunted MCC in this year consultative meetings hence the concern.
“The targeted projects could not be implemented and it is affecting ability of council to improve infrastructure, hence service delivery is impacted in a very negative way,” he said.
Some of the projects targeted for implementation using devolution funds are Mucheke trunk sewer and the construction of an Infectious diseases hospital among others.
He added that they are still engaging government over the issue.
“Yes council has engaged government and we will continue to do so” Mayor Tabe said.
MCC was allocated 52 06500 million ZIG for the year 2025 but they have not received anything.
Some residents like Sungano Zvarebwanashe feel that government’s lack of support shows that it’s not serious about service delivery improvement.
“This shows us that our government is not serious at all to improve service delivery in our cities if not all the cities and towns in the country and they later blame councils for failing to run cities , this is not fair at all, good service delivery is critical component to residents” she said.
Masvingo United Residents and Rate Payers Associations, Director, Anoziva Muguti expressed frustration over delays in disbursements this year saying it was affecting residents in a very big way.
“I am extremely disappointed about the lack of devolution funds from the government for 2025. This delay has crippled service delivery, causing numerous projects to stall, including the critical Mucheke Trunk Sewer project that’s been ongoing for over a decade. The residents of Masvingo are suffering due to the government’s failure to prioritize their needs” Muguti fumed.
Efforts to get a comment from Government were fruitless.
