The exercise could leave hundreds homeless and destroy the informal sector, a source of livelihood for the majority of residents.
Acting Town Clerk Lucia Mkhandla formally notified the city fathers of the proposed exercise during a recent full council meeting.
“The council wants to demolish all illegal structures which have sprouted in the city during the past years,” read the minutes from the meeting.
She also said all tuckshops that were constructed in breach of council bylaws should be demolished in the city, as well as a crackdown on unlicensed vendors. Mkhandla justified the timing of the exercise by saying that in the past the council did not have adequate manpower to address the issue.
Mayor Shadreck Tobaiwa said that although the matter was brought before the councillors, there was no consensus.
“We will not allow council management to bring misery to the people of Kwekwe by destroying their houses and sources of livelihood,” he said.
Zimbabwe is signatory to the United Nation’s International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights. In terms of this covenant, no government can evict people without having made an alternative plan to house them.
Sources told The Zimbabwean that the planned exercise was an act of retribution from top Zanu (PF) officials wishing to disturb the peace for the city’s councillors and MP Blessing Chebundo, all of whom are from the MDC-T party.
“The aim is to displace MDC supporters who would then probably go to the rural areas where they will be forced to toe the Zanu (PF) line,” said the source.
Post published in: News