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Municipal Reporter
No more houses will be demolished during the rainy season after the government barred Harare City Council from executing court orders allowing illegally built houses to be demolished until the end of the season.
But the government has emphasized that the orders are valid, they can be implemented when the rains end and that the regularization of land without services will be limited to the areas where the appropriate distribution plans have been prepared.
There will be no regularization of unplanned stands in wetlands or lands reserved for social services.
There are believed to be 22 demolition orders ready for implementation, all for various houses, and the government’s move follows the demolition of 190 houses in Budiriro, Harare, last week by the council on land reserved for a school, a measure described as legal. but at the right time as the rains are falling.
Speaking last night after yesterday’s cabinet meeting, the Minister of Local Government and Public Works, July Moyo, said that while the Government fully defends the rule of law and does not interfere with the Judiciary and its orders, the council must be sensitive to when you implement the orders.
“As a government, we support court orders and respect court orders at the request of the Harare City Council.
“For the avoidance of doubt, the Harare City Council is the one that requested these evictions. They received court orders. It is only the moment, and now we are saying not to carry out the rest of the evictions until there is an appropriate moment when it does not rain, ”he said.
Minister Moyo said that the government had no role in the Budiriro demolitions.
“The Harare City Council took the squatters to court. To date, it has obtained 23 court rulings in its favor and 22 have yet to be executed. The one executed is against the Cooperativa de Vivienda de Eventos, which is a split group from the Cooperativa de Vivienda de Tembwe, “he said, referring to the evictions and demolitions of Budiriro.
“It is not the government that took any of these to court. The court’s ruling was on January 29, 2020, against the affected families. This was in case number 4457/19. The affected families were warned and given time when they should have vacated, but because some of these families listen to the land barons, they had not answered the call. “
Minister Moyo said the city council made a request to make sure that court messengers were instructed to evacuate.
“At the same time, all those who have received eviction orders should know that these eviction orders are legal instruments and therefore cannot be challenged by individuals. As a government, we defend the rule of law. Unless people have gone to court to rescind these court orders, those court orders will be executed at the appropriate time. “
“That opportune moment is necessary to take advantage of the situation where it does not rain. We do not want, as a government, to throw people into the rain, “he said.
Minister Moyo said the government has made available alternative places where evicted families can be accommodated. But he reiterated that the evicted cannot return and build in those same places.
The national Minister of Housing and Social Services, Daniel Garwe, said that according to the human settlements policy there are selected areas that will be regularized.
“By regularizing what we are basically saying as a Government is that we need water, sewerage, roads and ICT. This can be provided in areas that had originally been designated for human settlement, ”he said.
“We are not talking about wetlands or areas reserved for social services. We mean the areas where people were properly set up and floor plans were produced and the booths have numbers, but for some strange reasons no services were provided. “
The Minister of State for the metropolitan province of Harare, Senator Oliver Chidawu, stressed that order was necessary for the country to develop.
The government call comes after Harare’s Acting City Clerk, Engineer Zvenyika Chawatama, said more demolitions would soon take place with a specific reference to the High Glen area where illegal settlers invaded land intended for a soccer field .
