The Sunday News
Vincent Gono, Sunday News Reporter
BULAWAYO Mayor Councillor Solomon Mguni has called on the Government to consider giving municipal police arresting powers similar to those of the Zimbabwe Republic Police (ZRP) and to set up municipal courts, saying this was the only way of dealing effectively with the flagrant violation of city by-laws.
Responding to questions raised over the chaos caused by money changers, vendors and pirate taxis at Tredgold Building which houses the magistrate’s courts, Clr Mguni said they have no problem dealing with pirate taxis and illegal parking around Tredgold except that raids were intermittent because they depend on national police since they have no arresting powers.
The handicap, the Mayor said, was that municipal police have no arresting powers. He called on the powers that be to establish municipal courts and give municipal police arresting powers.
“Our problem is dealing with illegal money changers because our municipal police have no arresting powers. If our police had arresting powers and the city had municipal courts to prosecute offenders for blocking streets and pavements, it would be easier for us to enforce our by-laws.
“The answer here lies in giving our metro police all the powers of a national police force and creation of municipal courts which will enforce our by-law. Otherwise as it is, the money changers, vendors, pirate taxi drivers will continue playing cat and mouse with national police force to the detriment of public safety and decency.
“We have problems with kombis which are unbranded and don’t belong to any of the three companies, Tshova-Mubaiwa, Bulawayo City Transit (BCT) and Bulawayo United Passenger Transport Association (Bupta). Those are the ones blocking the streets at Fort Street and Leopold Takawira Avenue.
“We have asked for national police to help our municipal police to enforce traffic rules at that place because, like I said our municipal police have no arresting powers which obtain in other cities like Johannesburg, South Africa. That’s our major challenge,” he said.
Judiciary Services Commission Acting Secretary, Mr Walter Chikwanha said on Thursday that the Tredgold Magistrate’s Court like what Chief Justice Luke Malaba had said, should not co-exist with illegality.
He said the effect of the disorder was that people would not have confidence in the justice system if illegal activities were allowed to take place on the doorstep of the courts.
“We wrote a letter to Bulawayo City Council for them to see how they can deal with the situation so that there is some semblance of order outside that court so that even people who come to that court have confidence in the system,” said Mr Chikwanha.
Clr Mguni said they were working on closing 6th Avenue to outgoing traffic and make it a one-way inlet street so that they open 3rd Avenue as the one way outgoing street. This, they believe will take commuters further away from near Tredgold Building to downtown nearer to the outlet street. That way, the mayor said they would have solved the problem of commuters parking along Fort Street and L Takawira Avenue.
“The Chief Justice had suggested that we close the section of Fort Street near Tredgold. The challenge with that is we are talking about the heart of the city. We fear that there will be a lot of congestion in the CBD if we were to do that.
“We have, however, placed the issue before our town planning people for an opinion on the feasibility of such a measure. But in the interim we are pursuing the 3rd Avenue and 6th Avenue redesign approach to see if it works to our advantage,” he added.
