The Sunday News
Vusumuzi Dube, Online News Editor
THE Bulawayo City Council (BCC) has resolved to divert funds meant for service delivery to the construction of a Z$25 million mayoral mansion in Selbourne Park.
The local authority has abandoned its original idea of renovating a house at the exclusive Hornung Golf Club in Burnside into a mayoral mansion noting that works required will be slightly less than what was required to construct a new mayoral mansion.
According to a council report, the renovation works at the Hornung Golf Club property were estimated to cost US$146 364, while construction of a new mansion was valued at Z$25 million. The local authority, however, revealed that to fund the construction they will veriment some funds which were budgeted for service delivery.
Further, the local authority will be employing 30 contract workers so as to complete “the special project on time”, this further putting a burden on the already high council wage bill.
“It will be recalled that Council resolved that its house at Hornung Golf Club be turned into mayoral accommodation and security be provided to the property and its occupants. Upon inspection of the property it was noted that some renovations needed to be done before the occupation.
“(However) the estimated building costs of a new house were slightly higher than the renovation costs. It was also noted that council could utilise its Building branch staff to conduct the special project. The team further recommended that additional temporary contract staff (30 workers) distributed among builders, bricklayers, labourers, and carpenters be procured to assist in ensuring that the deadline is met,” reads the council report.
According to a plan of works for the initial idea of renovating the Hornung Golf Club property, the breakdown was for the main house renovations; US$15 150, boundary wall US$103 572, guard room US$10 625 and a double garage US$17 019.
The local authority aims to have completed the construction of the new mayoral mansion in three to five months.
“It was also noted that a total of $25 000 000 be viremented from vote 0084/12244 ($16 200 000) and 0084/12245 ($8 800 000) to cater for building costs for the mayoral mansion,” reads the report.
In April the decision to provide the Mayor, Councillor Solomon Mguni with a mayoral mansion attracted a backlash from residents who questioned the logic of Clr Mguni moving away from his Ward 23 thereby neglecting his elected duties.
According to a council confidential report, after the Mayor’s car was broken into, council considered to move him to a secure accommodation, claiming Clr Mguni could be attacked by disgruntled stakeholders.
“The person of the Mayor might be a target of attacks by virtue of the office he occupies. Besides everyday thuggery, the Mayor might be targeted for attacks by disgruntled stakeholders for the reason that he is the council’s figurehead. Such attacks might have perilous results.
Council owns a certain property at Hornung Golf Club and it is currently leased to a tenant. The Town Clerk (Mr Christopher Dube) considered it prudent that this be transformed into the mayoral accommodation and that council provides security to guard the property and the occupants,” reads part of the report.
