The Sunday News
Vusumuzi Dube, Online News Editor
BULAWAYO residents have demanded an all stakeholders meeting with the Bulawayo City Council (BCC) and Tendy Three International (TTI) over the new parking fees set to come into effect on Friday.
The new fees will see motorists paying US$1 for 30 minutes, for what the local authority has termed prime parking.
For ordinary parking, motorists will pay US$1 for an hour.
According to the local authority, the project is being implemented in phases, with phase 1, which will cater for the prime parking in the city set to cover Leopold Takawira Avenue to 11th Avenue and Fife Street to Joshua Mqabuko Nkomo Street.
The second phase to the sixth phase will be an expansion from the area covered by the first phase until the whole city is encompassed. Once complete, there would be 7 200 parking bays in the city under the system. On Friday, they will commence with 174 parking bays.
Reacting to the new charges, Bulawayo Progressive Residents Association (BPRA) coordinator, Mr Emmanuel Ndlovu said the new fees showed that stakeholder consultation had been lacking, hence the public outcry.
“This is a pilot project and in all fairness you cannot start with such ridiculous fees, it’s like BCC wants to force them on residents without even considering the obtaining situation. As it is residents are struggling to pay their rates, now they want to add another burden.
“The local authority forgets that a majority of the people are informal traders and these fees will further worsen their plight. We have already started the process of inviting various stakeholders including BCC and TTI officials so that this matter can be dealt with,” said Mr Ndlovu.
TTI won the bid to implement the system in July 2020 and got the green light from Cabinet for them to start operations in August last year after the council had submitted their papers to the Zimbabwe Investment and Development Agency (Zida).
