Talent Gore
THE Harare Residents Trust has said municipal police officers are benefiting from vendors, who are stationed in CBD, as they are given bribes as a means to avoid arrest.
Harare Residents Trust director, Precious Shumba, said engagements with the vendors revealed that most of municipal officers were demanding bribes from them.
“In our community engagements with vendors, they have said that if the Council puts in place a mechanism to register and charge them for their spaces, they will gladly register and pay as long as the fees are reasonable and affordable for the majority of them,” he said.
“It is unfortunate that the City of Harare put in place an SMEs policy but they have not moved an inch to ensure that vendors are treated with dignity.”
Daily, municipal police arrest the vendors in joint operations with the Zimbabwe Republic Police, but the majority of the arrested vendors never reach any police station.
Shumba said the beneficiaries of the chaos are the municipal officers who are chasing after the vendors.
“This is one of the reasons we have traffic and municipal police officers stationed at Mbare refusing to be transferred, fighting their transfers in the courts,” he said.
“It is because they individually and collectively benefit but the council gains no cent.”