GWERU – The Gweru City Council is set to cut more than 600 jobs in an effort to lower its monthly salary bill.
The city, which currently has almost 1,400 employees, will reduce its workforce to just over 790 workers as it seeks to revive and implement its adopted 2015 Job Evaluation Programme.
Speaking on the sidelines of the City’s Job Evaluation workshop in Gweru on Tuesday, Gweru mayor Josiah Makombe said the initial 2015 job evaluation report was never implemented upon its completion around 2017 and council has since realised its importance in light of the city’s current financial status.
Said Makombe: “In 2015 council embarked on a job evaluation exercise which was funded by GIZ (German International Corporation) to relook at the organogram of the city that could be effective in terms of service delivery and in tandem with our revenue collection.
“The report was shelved but we have realised it was a good project and felt we need to relook at it and resuscitate it.
“The current establishment is around 1,400 and with the job evaluation we will have about 790 employees and from that number we see that we will be saving in terms of money, every employee of council will be efficient in discharging their duties in terms of service delivery.”
The city’s current average monthly salary bill is about ZW$20 million in the first three months of the year 2021, almost half the council’s average monthly revenue of ZW$47 million during the same period.
Mayor Makombe however said no employees will be immediately dismissed but it will be a process.
“There is likelihood that some people will be affected but that is not our intention, we would like to implement the job evaluation without dismissing anyone; having a mechanism where we will not replace anyone who leaves employment either by death, resignation or retirement,” he said.
The job evaluation programme was resisted by Gweru Council Workers Union in 2017 accusing the council administration of being insensitive and acting as if they were oblivious of the economic situation in the country.
The then Town Clerk Elizabeth Gwatipedza said the monthly salary bill was overlapping the city’s monthly revenue which made service delivery in the city problematic.
Makombe said some offices within the local authority were in duplication of others and overstaffed, basically doing the same work.
Some employees from offices to be closed will be reshuffled internally to fill in key positions that cannot be left vacant, as Makombe says, with a committee having been setup to evaluate every employee’s qualification and capabilities.
Gweru City Council is currently owed almost ZW$278 million with domestic debtors taking up the largest chunk of almost ZW$160 million in the first three months of the year, while owing its service providers almost ZW$110 million in the same period.
