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Why Zinara struggles to fund road upgrades

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Former Zimbabwe National Road Administration (Zinara) board chairperson Bernard Musarurwa says toll fees are not helping to maintain the country’s road network because most of the money is lost through contracts tying the state entity into unfair deals.

Musarurwa (BM), a civil and geological engineer, told Alpha Media Holdings chairman Trevor Ncube (TN) on the platform In Conversation With Trevor

that for example a huge part of the money collected from toll fees and vehicle licensing was taken by a company that provided Zinara with software.

He said there was no political will to review the contracts that were bleeding Zinara.

TN: You know as I was reading around researching, I was fully convinced that you are the man we should blame for the pathetic state that our roads are in?

BM: Yes, our roads are in a very sorry state.

Perhaps that is why I am here, to try and explain what is happening to our roads sector.

I have spent 45 years of my professional career in roads, so I understand, live and breathe roads.

So I would like to share with you my opinions on what is happening and what needs to happen.

TN: What is happening Bernard Musarurwa?

BM: What is happening essentially is that we are failing as a country to put in sufficient resources required to maintain our national roads network.

We know what has gone wrong. We had done things that would have solved the problem when we set up Zinara.

I will explain to you that I was involved in the creation of Zinara, as far back as 1994.

That is how far back we went in establishing Zinara, which started off with an institutional study that was funded by the World Bank.

The World Bank had come up with a proposal to say how do we sustain funding of the maintenance of the national roads network in every country.

So they came up with a series of suggestions, and the one that seemed to have found acceptance around the world, not only in Zimbabwe, but all over the world is this principle of the road-userpays principle.

We do that with our utility services, if you do not pay for the electricity you get cut off, if you do not pay for your water you get cut off.

However, for roads we seem not to have a way of cutting off one from driving if they have not contributed towards the maintenance of the roads.

So the road-user-pays principle targeted certain road user charges.

These are charges that can be levied on every motorist to try and get the required revenue for the sustainable funding for the roads network.

Through this institutional study which was initiated by the World Bank, Zimbabwe also embarked on the same road user charges principle.

From 1994 there were consultations with various players around the country before we went in.

That was the national institutional study before we went on to establish what was called the Road Sector Reform and Development Programme (RSDP).

The RSDP was now coming up with the various operational manuals. It even included the drafting of The Roads Act (Chapter 13), which then led to the creation of the Road Fund and the establishing of Zinara.

Through this process, it was established that there was need to come up with road user charges where the motorist would contribute.

TN: This is tolling? No? BM: No, not at all. Not only tolling. There are several road user charges.

TN: Can we go through those? What are those?

BM: The first and foremost fundamental one is the road levy, or the fuel levy. This is levied on the pump race of fuel. Where every time...

TN: Fuel levy. Road levy? BM: No then there is the toll gate fees.

These are fees levied at the 29 odd toll gates scattered around the country where motorists pay to pass through that particular toll gate with the funds accruing to the road fund.

Then there is the traditional vehicle licensing.

Every motorist has to licence their vehicle every quarter or whatever period through the local authorities which was the case before, but nowadays it is done at various outlets that are operated by Zinara.

Again, the vehicle license fees accrue to the road fund.

There is also what is called the transit fees.

These are fees collected at entry points for vehicles, foreign registered vehicles transiting through Zimbabwe.

I can put them in perspective for you, in as far as the last published information that I have got on the amounts that were accruing to the road fund.

The toll gate fees, this is going back to the 2016/17 budget, the Zinara budget for which I have got the figures.

The toll gate fees were accumulating to about US$60 million per annum.

A similar amount was also being collected from the fuel levy.

A similar amount was being collected from the vehicle licensing fees. And about US$20 million was being collected from the transit fees.

So you will find that between 2015-2017 the road fund was collecting about US$200 million, which was supposed to be dispersed to the 93 designated road authorities.

These are your rural district councils, your urban councils and town boards, as well as the District Development Fund and the Department of Roads in the Ministry of Transport.

Those are the 93 designated authorities.

TN: So if we are raising, Engineer Musarurwa, US$200 million a year, how come our roads are in such a terrible state.

BM: It is very simple. From around 2009 when these funds were being collected and dispersed to the road authorities, they happened to have been some malfeasance, the funds that were being collected were being hijacked.

When you look at the 2016 Zinara budget and you find out that only US$48 million out of the US$200 million collected for the road Fund ended up with the 93 designated road authorities with the other US$152 million going to other expenses, then you realise what was happening.

TN: What other expenses? BM: This is the tricky part of it.

TN: Okay.

BM: I won’t try and say what I think...

TN: I think for the benefit of the viewers all over the world, it is important to let them know that you were the founding chairman of Zinara, so you obviously speak with a lot of authority.

You were chairman of Zinara from 2001 to 2005, so back to that point you were saying there is US$200 million that got to be dispersed for the construction and improvement and repairing of our roads, but you as Zinara get US$48 million.

So my question is where does the rest go to?

And you say there is malfeasance there.

And I am saying what does this sound like? What does this look like?

BM: Well, it looks like there are various misappropriation of the funds with contracts where work was not done that was supposed to have been done on certain roads.

There were certain individuals and contractors that were paid monies to construct or maintain roads.

Now, let me go back a bit and explain the purpose and intention of the road fund.

TN: Before you go there, we will go to the road fund.

So you are saying, people were paid then did not do work?

BM: We have got certain contracts, some of which are still in subsistence today.

If you look at the portfolio committee on public accounts, they produced a report on Zinara.

If you look at the forensic audit done by a private entity, they (both reports), clearly indicate what has gone wrong at Zinara.

There are activities that bordered on criminality in the abuse of those funds.

TN: By the way, sorry to cut your stride there, both Parliament and the Auditor General have come out consistently with negative reports on Zinara and the road fund. BM: Yes they have. Ironically, no clear cut action has been taken.

Yes, there have been some token arrests, but we still have some of the contracts which have been identified in these reports as being unfair.

TN: Are there any that stick out?

BM: Yes. Okay I will tell you the two that stick out like a sore thumb.

There is an entity that provides the software that is used at the toll gates.

Zinara used to operate 29 toll gates. Nineteen of those are still being operated by Zinara.

The other ones that are on the Plumtree-Bulawayo, Harare-Mutare, Forbes Road have been now taken over by another entity that is running those toll gates.

Those being run by Zinara they use a software that is used in collecting the funds.

The software is being charged at 18% of the revenue collected.

To put it in perspective in 2016/17 that translated to US$9 million for the software annually.

Similarly, the software that is being used for the licensing of vehicles at the various outlets that are operated by Zinara, which licensing used to be done at the district offices or the City Of Harare local authority, that was taken over.

Again there is another US$60 million collected from the vehicle license fees which used to be collected then, which translates to another US$9 million for the software used for the vehicle licensing.

When you add, and this is all in the reports, when you add the actual collection fees of about US$7 million, that entity was collecting up to US$25 million for the software.

TN: Do we know this entity? What are they called?

BM: They are there in the reports.

TN: Okay.

BM: Southern Trading Company.

TN: Who owns that Southern Trading Company?

BM: It is not clear exactly who owns it, but if you look at the reports that I have referred to, the forensic audit report and the parliamentary portfolio committee report on Zinara, the details are presented there.

There have been efforts by previous boards to try and get away from this situation, to try and redo or renegotiate these contracts which obviously look unreasonable and unfair.

That is one.

TN: These efforts have come to naught?

BM: So far. There does not seem to be the desire to rectify this issue, I do not know why.

TN: Why do you think it is not being rectified?

As former chairman of Zinara you must have some inside intelligence or some information that explains why these contracts, which are so onerous?

BM: Besides being the inaugural chairman of Zinara from 2001-2005, this was following my involvement in the institutional study of the RSDP, I was then invited by the then minister, the late Swithun Mombeshora, to chair the board of Zinara.

The answer to your question Trevor is very simple, there is some reluctance, I do not know exactly where it stems, why the powers-that-be, the relevant authorities.

Zinara falls under the responsibility of the minister of Transport, and obviously the minister reports to the Office of the President and Cabinet.

But with all these reports and evidence that has been presented, it is baffling why nothing is being done to recover the situation.

TN: Am I correct in this, correct me if I am wrong, but as you are saying and what I have read, my suspicion is that whoever this company belongs to must be connected to somebody at the top because that is the only reason that could result in a case where these onerous charges and what this company is getting goes on at the expense of the people that are paying and the roads are still in such a terrible situation.

BM: That has to be the explanation.

That someone is paying a blind eye to an obvious travesty that is happening to our roads network.

Trevor, when you look at the fact that in 2016/17, there was a national road condition survey that was conducted, which came out indicating that the majority of our roads are in a poor to fair state with very few of our roads in a reasonable condition.

Local News

en-zw

2022-06-26T07:00:00.0000000Z

2022-06-26T07:00:00.0000000Z

https://digital.alphamedia.co.zw/article/281560884476077

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