The Sunday News
Chrispen Gumunyu, Business Reporter
A NEW lobby group, National Consumer Rights Association (Nacora) has been launched in a bid to advocate for consumers’ basic rights.
Speaking at the launch, which coincided with the World Consumer Rights Day on Friday, one of the advisers, Mr Effie Ncube, said the formation of the association was aimed at curbing unfair and fraudulent conduct being exerted on consumers by unscrupulous businesses.
“Nacora is a citizens-driven non-governmental organisation empowering consumers through promoting, protecting and defending their rights in respect of goods and services provided by the private and public sectors cognisant of the fact that a majority of consumers are the poorest and most vulnerable members of society. With this launch, the era of trashing and violating consumer rights with impunity in Zimbabwe has come to an end,” said Mr Ncube.
He said the launch of the organisation comes at a time when a number of consumer rights were being deliberately ignored and violated with the most prominent being wanton price increases on basic commodities.
“This organisation comes at an opportune time when the pain and strain of being denied rights as a consumer is being felt right across Zimbabwe. Consumers have no seat on the decision-making forums and their interests as the main and biggest drivers of the economy are being shredded. They have been reduced to just being statistics,” Mr Ncube said.
He said the association intends to take legal action against any business found liable of infringing consumer rights.
“In everything we do we will seek to engage the stakeholder, we will not hesitate to take to the streets, drag companies and Government to court for redress, and boycott the goods and services of offenders. We will take decisive steps to empower the consumer to defend their rights through education and training, awareness campaigns, and stakeholder meetings. We will engage Government and the business community through roundtables, seminars and capacity building workshops,” Mr Ncube.
The Government is in the process of introducing the Consumer Protection Act. The Act would result in the establishment of a Consumer Court and a Consumer Protection Commission.
The Consumer Protection Commission to be created once the Bill has been passed will co-ordinate and network consumer activities; promote fair business practices and protect consumers from unreasonable, unjust otherwise improper trade practices, deceptive, misleading, unfair and fraudulent conduct.
