Vic Falls Residents At Loggerheads With Authorities Over Rates

Victoria Falls town centre: Residents are failing to pay their rates to the council owing to job losses in the tourism sector due to the global pandemic. Image by Bgabel | Wikivoyage

by Bokani Mudimba

Victoria Falls’ economy is centred around tourism, COVID-19 has left a tail of economic destruction across the town, local government wants to conduct business as usual, residents say they will not have any of it.

VICTORIA FALLS, September 11, 2020. (The Citizen Bulletin) — COVID-19 has set Victoria Falls Municipality and its residents at loggerheads over payment of bills and rates.

The country’s resort town could be the hardest hit by the global pandemic which has halted the town’s economy—largely reliant on tourism.

International travel restrictions led to the closure of the tourism industry and other businesses which depended on tourists to survive. Thousands were rendered jobless with no disposable income to pay council rates.

According to tourism industry trade unionist Edward Dzapasi, about 90 percent of Victoria Falls residents were employed in the tourism industry and more than three quarters of them have lost their jobs because of the Covid-19 induced lockdown.

Godfrey Sibanda, a senior resident, and businessman has accused the council of being insensitive to people’s plight.

“Council is the only institution that is getting money in this town during this Covid-19 period because they continue to exorbitantly bill businesses and people despite loss of jobs. They should at least be considerate and waive some rates until the situation improves because people are struggling and surviving on well-wishers,” says Sibanda.

Sibanda argues that it is only reasonable for the council to consider suspending some levies.

Residents who attended council’s 2021 budget consultation meetings that started last week concur.

Last year the council crafted a $354 million budget, more than 800 percent increase from the $22 million budget for 2019, causing conflict with residents who complained that monthly water charges had skyrocketed to around $3 000 on average per household.

“Council bills and rates are just too high. They don’t even consider that people are affected by Covid-19. How can a resident who lost a job be charged $4 000 for water? We have been paying streetlights, education, roads and environmental levies for the past 20 years but the service is still not there. This shows they are not important and should be suspended until the situation improves,” said Nelly Dube, chairperson of Chinotimba Old Market Vendors Association.

Each household pays $20 per month for each of the levy.

Victoria Falls Combined Residents Association chairman Kelvin Moyo has urged council to find alternative ways of getting revenue.

“They should come up with sustainable ways of raising revenue than to wait for ratepayers. Overcharging residents will not improve revenue flows but will worsen the situation leaving ratepayers indebted,” he says.

The town’s deputy Mayor Councillor Patricia Mwale who is Ward 4 councillor encouraged residents to engage the municipality and follow up on their concerns.

Speaking during budget meetings, town treasurer Neville Ndlovu acknowledged that residents are failing to pay as the council had by 30 June only collected $44 million from $99 million worth of invoices.

He says council has targeted to have collected $152 million of the total $354 million at half year.

“Covid-19 led to closure of tourism, loss of jobs, change of currency and pricing system which has affected our operations because we depend on the tourism industry. We can only hope Covid-19 ends soon.”
Neville Ndlovu, Victoria Falls town treasurer

“Land levy is a supplementary or rate charged by the local authority on every resident while streetlights levy is a public good service charge also paid by every resident living in town. Only the education levy is negotiable and can be removed if residents feel so.”

While there is no Government position on rates payment by ratepayers in the wake of Covid-19, Local Government and Public Works Minister July Moyo recently sent a circular to all local authorities stating that councils were with immediate effect compelled to invite officials from the ministry to attend all full council meetings to safeguard national interest, which include monitoring budgets.

At the start of the lockdown, President Mnangagwa had called for a three months waiver of rentals for businesses and citizens but lifted the moratorium at the end of June.

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