Friday the 26th of March 2021 witnessed Masvingo City Council signing a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with Environmental Management Agency for the development of harmonious and cooperative relations with the purpose of ensuring the protection and cleanliness of the environment within the city as well as enforcement of all environmental laws and regulations within Masvingo City Council’s jurisdiction.
The partnership seeks to ensure that Masvingo City transforms itself and becomes a centre of environmental excellence, establishing an Environmental Inspectorate Unit (EIU) manned by Environmental Management Inspectors (EMI) who will be charged with the duty to enforce environmental by-laws in Masvingo City Council’s area of jurisdiction. The partnership includes reviewing of existing Council environmental by-laws and capacitation of the EIU.
True to its vision, ‘An Industrialised World-Class Metropolitan City by 2030’, the MoU reaffirms the Council’s commitment to keeping environments clean. The MoU is therefore aimed at improving the environmental law-enforcement framework for Masvingo City Council hence a committee comprised of Masvingo City Council, EMA, Ministry of Health and Child Care, Zimbabwe Parks and Wildlife Management Authority, Forestry Commission, ZINWA, National Prosecuting Authority (NPA) and Zimbabwe Republic Police (ZRP) was formed to review and update existing Council by-laws. This resulted in the production of the draft City of Masvingo Environment (Noise and Nuisance) By-laws.
Over and above all this, the MoU saw the creation of a unit made up of 35 members drawn from all the relevant departments of Council, and also EMA handing over 3 motorcycles to the City of Masvingo to carry out environmental inspections, licensing for environmental pollution and prosecuting where there are environmental offenses.
Apart from the creation of the unit, the team was trained on national environmental law, carrying out environmental inspections, prosecution procedure and the draft by-law. The unit was also trained on how to conduct field inspections and prosecutions.
Present during the signing ceremony were District Development Coordinator’s Office, The Mayor, Cllr C Maboke, Deputy Mayor, Cllr W Mawende, Alderman S Maridza, Councillors, Acting Town Clerk, Eng E Mukaratirwa, Management, Croco Motors Manager, Mr Chawonza, Provincial Environmental Management Agency, Mr M Muusha, EMA officials, members from the Health Department, Transport office, municipal police, procurement, audit, human resources as well as members of the media.

The City of Masvingo, has added 12 vehicles to its existing fleet. The new vehicles comprise of 1 refuse compactor, 1 Toyota minibus, 5 Toyota Sedan vehicles, and 5 Nissan pick-up trucks. The vehicles which were purchased using revenue raised from the ratepayers are expected to enhance service delivery.

Speaking during the commissioning ceremony on Friday 26 March 2021, His Worship, The Mayor, Cllr C Maboke said the vehicles will improve efficiency of the local authority in service delivery.

‘The City of Masvingo is fully committed to excellent service delivery through procurement of latest ideal state of the art equipment/vehicles to ensure we attain our vision to be an Industrialised Metropolitan City By 2030. Today we commission our refuse compactor and a fleet of operational vehicles that will be used by our different departments to enhance efficient and effective service delivery.

These vehicles were bought using revenue raised from the ratepayers and we thank the residents and ratepayers and at the same time encouraging them to continue paying their bills in order to capacitate us to provide services. We will be purchasing more equipment this year that includes a Refuse Compactor and a Tipper. We continue to value the support of our various stakeholders and the Central Government in this service delivery journey’ he said.

Among those who attended the commissioning ceremony were the District Development Coordinator’s Office, Deputy Mayor, Cllr W Mawende, Alderman S Maridza, Councillors, Acting Town Clerk, Eng E Mukaratirwa, Management, Croco Motors Manager, Mr Chawonza, EMA officials, members from the Health Department, Transport office, municipal police, procurement, audit, human resources as well as members of the media.

The City of Masvingo has held a two-day Departmental Integrated Performance Agreement workshop from the 25^th to the 26^th of February 2021 aimed at mapping strategies and set targets for the year 2021, in line with the local authority’s vision, to be an industrialised metropolitan city by 2030.

In his welcome and closing remarks, City of Masvingo Acting Town Clerk, Eng Edward Mukaratirwa urged all departments and Councillors to successfully achieve the targeted goals for the year 2021.

‘Let’s deal with the major issues, let’s achieve so that when we also leave the system, we can be able to leave some legacy so that when we look  back, we would be proud of what we would have done and probably done more that we have set up now. Failure to set and understand our goals means our performance monitoring and DIPA are out of sync,’ said Eng Mukaratirwa.

The Acting Town Clerk also emphasised the importance of teamwork, noting that there was a need for members to work together and be able to leave a legacy.

The workshop afforded the Councillors and Council’s senior administration with a platform to set targets that will provide for the impetus for the efficient administration of Council as well as plan for the 2021 calendar year in order to create a road-map that will ensure the success of the local authority.

The two-day workshop focused on key major result areas that of Infrastructure development and maintenance, Social service provision, Good corporate governance, Investment promotion and Environmental management services

The workshop was attended by the Councillors and Council Management and ended on a high note with participants geared for the year 2021.

True to its vision of becoming a world class metropolitan city by 2030, the City of Masvingo is set to roll out water augmentation phase 2 at an estimated budget of ZWL 270 000. 000, as the local authority intensifies its commitment to ensure excellent service delivery.

The much long-awaited project is aimed at improving the water situation in the city which is currently in a pathetic state due to a series of electrical faults at Bushmead Waterworks. The project will see acquisition of high-tech equipment to support the waterworks plant. This initiative is part of the City’s commitment to ensure residents get clean and safe water.

The increasing demand due to ballooning population as a result of population and property growth, coupled with pressures from new developments for connections onto the existing constrained water system as well as the depreciating equipment of the plant of the oldest city in the country has caused Masvingo to be a water stressed city.

The plant which was commissioned in the early 70s, and was later expanded twice in 1984 and 2003 now has depreciating equipment. Hence, rolling out of the programme comes with it the benefits of an expanded plant and abundant water supply.

Currently, water supply capacity is at 30 megalitres per day against an estimated demand of 50 megalitres, thus a deficit of 20 megalitres.

To manage the deficit, the City has instituted a programme to close off valves to the town overnight while building up head in the reservoirs. This ensures that the residents get water at the critical time of the morning before they embark on their daily chores.

Lately, the City entered into partnerships for cooperation with the donor community, DFID, UNICEF, Christian Care Zimbabwe and DWSSC in installation of solar powered water systems in the high density suburb of Mucheke to ensure availability of water all the time.

Masvingo City Council is moving forward to achieve its vision of being a world class metropolitan city by 2030 guided by a national strategic intent as pronounced by the desire to attain upper-middle-class income status by 2030 as expounded by President E. D Mnangagwa.