Social and economic think tank organisation, the Zimbabwe Coalition on Debt and Development (ZIMCODD) has called on local authorities to implement recommendations made by the Auditor General report.
Addressing journalists on the sidelines of ZIMCODD research launch, director Janet Zhou said mis-governance had impacted heavily on the cost of living.
“The abuse of public funds has become rampant in local authorities with ‘tenderpreneurship’, economies of affection, nepotism, and partisan politics complimenting to militate against optimum efficiency thereby undermine service delivery. This governance miscarriage has aggravated the cost of living.
“Ironically, local authorities have failed to adhere, and implement the recommendations prescribed by the Auditor-General. To this end, ZIMCODD undertook a tracking survey of the Auditor-General`s Recommendation with the main aim of unearthing the challenges those local authorities are encountering and proffer actionable recommendations that will help them to improve the management of public funds and service delivery in general,” said Zhou.
She said most local authorities had failed to implement the recommendations made by the Auditor General.
“Many local authorities are failing to implement the Auditor-General’s recommendations. For instance, out of the 7 local authorities surveyed in Masvingo Province, 5 had implemented less than 50% of the recommendations while in Midlands Province about 67% of the recommendations were not implemented by surveyed local authorities.
“Also, in Manicaland Province, only 33% of recommendations were implemented by Mutare City Council. Given the vitality of quality public service delivery to the majority of low-income Zimbabweans, ZIMCODD implores the government through the responsible ministries to disburse devolution funds on a timely basis to allow local authorities to fully utilize these funds before their value is eroded by inflation. This is critical in expanding the fiscal space for local authorities,” she said.
Zhou said local authorities had cited political interference as a hindrance to their operations saying there was need to capacitate local authorities’ staff.
“Public officials in local authorities highlighted that too much government and political interference is hindering their operations. As such, there is need to ensure limited interference in their day-to-day operations.
“Furthermore, capacity building of management and staff at local authorities to adequately prepare them for full compliance with Auditor-General findings especially in adhering to International Public Accounting Standards, internal auditing, risk management, and revenue collection, recovery, and management,” Zhou said.
