Zanu PF-youths operating as marshals have invaded city ranks in Kwekwe where they have taken charge of traffic and are collecting fees from pirate taxis.
Masvingo Mirror reports that it learnt this through Kwekwe Ward 3 Councillor, Pikurai Msipa at the local authority’s full council meeting held two weeks ago.
The local authority is as a result struggling to rid the roads of illegal pirate taxis and collect revenue from designated vendors’ stalls, alleged Msipa.
ZANU PF councillor Makomborero edu Mlambo of Ward 8 Amaveni conceded that council was losing revenue but disputed allegations that marshals illegally collecting money from pirate taxis were from his party.
Msipa alleged that the marshals move around in Zanu PF regalia and they are controlled by powerful party officials in the Midlands.
“The situation is so bad that even the local authority’s marshals take orders from the illegal party marshals.
“We are losing revenue as council because there are some people who wear certain party regalia and collect money from transporters in our bus terminus daily.
“These people have the power to control our council police officers. Our officers are taking orders from them that is why we are struggling with pirate taxis.
“We have pirate taxis for Amaveni and we always see these people wearing a certain party T-shirt collecting money from those pirate taxis operators,” said Msipa.
“I beg to differ because there is no one from my party doing that. It’s true that we are losing money and we expect council to do something but this money is not being lost because of people from my party,” he said.
Acting Chamber Secretary, Athunas Chidzurira said the only people responsible for collecting revenue are council officials.
“We only know of our council officers who collect revenue from our residents and we encourage residents to pay to our officials,” he said.
Sources however, told The Mirror that the illegal collection of revenue from the ranks is a corrupt activity that has been going on for many years.
