By Correspondent
Harare City Council
Harare Town Clerk Engineer Hosiah Chisango recently said that the local authority is owed a staggering $1.5 trillion by ratepayers.
This has compromised its ability to provide essential services like water, garbage collection and sanitation.
Mayor Mafume said the council will engage with the Ministry of Local Government to discuss settling the debt.
Bulawayo City Council
Bulawayo has expressed concern over the rise in indebtedness by rate payers who owe the local authority more than $200 billion.
Businesses, domestic consumers and Government departments owe close to $217 billion in unpaid monthly bills.
According to council, domestic debtors owe the biggest chunk with a staggering $128,5 billion.
They are followed by industry and commerce players who woe $69, 6 billion.
Government debtors owe the least at $18, 98 billion.
All in total, the city council is owed $217,128,463,545.
Gweru City Council
Mayor Martin Chivhoko revealed last week that Gweru is in the process of engaging a debt collector to recover more than ZWL$70 billion owed by residents.
Chivhoko said as of December 2023, council was owed ZWL$71 billion, up from ZWL$54 billion in October.
He said businesses owed the local authority ZLW$37 billion, residents ZWL$26 billion, while government departments owed ZWL$7,7 billion.
However, Central Government has previously dissuaded Councils from engaging debt collectors.
Kadoma City
Council Kadoma City Council has previously embarked on a door-to-door campaign to recover over $40 million owed by ratepayers to improve revenue inflows.
The initiative has not been effective and its budget performance is at 64 percent.
This is way below expectations considering the amount of creditors it has.
Debt-Ridden Authorities
Various other local authorities that are struggling with debts include Redcliff Municipality.
Since the collapse of Ziscosteel over a decade ago thousands of residents in Redcliff have been failing to service their debts after the sole breadwinners were rendered jobless.
Kwekwe City Council has also struggled collecting its money from debtors.
This has included money owed by fellow local authorities such as Redcliff Municipality which last year owed over ZWL$20 million for water supplies.
Norton Town Council has also struggled servicing its own debts and in 2021 had water cut off by Harare over a US$2 million debt.
