Harare’s half-million-dollar habit of rewarding in...

Harare’s half-million-dollar habit of rewarding incompetence, punishing residents

What US$500,000 can achieve monthly

Drill 100 boreholes across water-starved suburbs like Mabvuku and Budiriro each month then move on to installing solar pumps, storage and reticulation infrastructure so that residents don’t have to line up and carry water as though they are living in the Middle Ages.
Resurface 5 km of city roads each month, gradually improving Harare’s deplorable residential roads.
Fund garbage collection contracts in 20 wards, to create a more beautiful, cleaner and healthier city.

Harare’s senior executives will continue to earn ridiculous salaries for poor service delivery, creaming off around US$400,000 in monthly salaries —after government directives to cut their earnings.

Acting Town Clerk Phakamile Mabhena-Moyo this week said he had not yet received the directive on the proposed 20% salary cuts — meaning the half-million-dollar wage bill still stands but Zim Now understands that this is just a bureaucratic snafu.

This comes after the Justice Maphios Cheda Commission of Inquiry, appointed to investigate Harare’s financial rot, exposed staggering executive compensation in a city that is failing in its basic delivery mandate of collecting refuse, treating water, and fixing roads.
Mayor Jacob Mafume told the commission that the Town Clerk earns about US$27,000 a month, while other directors take home between US$15,000 and US$25,000, plus perks — fuel, school fees, entertainment, and clothing allowances.

**Harare's tainted Sunshine City presided over by a highly paid executive**

That means one executive’s monthly package equals the combined earnings of over 50 council clinic nurses, who typically take home between US$350 and US$500. The paltry earnings of the workers have been linked to poor delivery at health centres as they resort to stealing resources including medication and even infrastructure items like solar panels.

City of Harare’s Sally Mugabe Hospital is currently operating without a functional scan machine, and patients are being directed to expensive private health care facilities for radiology services.

Instead, the city revenue is directed into boardroom pockets every 30 days — while the engines of service run on fumes. The moral equation is as clear as the financial one: executives are earning premium salaries to preside over decline.