Masvingo City Council procures Toyota Prado for US$251 816; more than double the market value

By Staff Reporter

MASVINGO City Council bought a Toyota Prado vehicle for a whooping US$251 816 despite the vehicle common market price being far lesser than half on the back of  other deep seated scandals.

In fact, the MCC report indicates the local authority is the most badly run under the City Councils category.   

The scary details contained in the just released Auditor General’s (AG) report on the MCC financial reveals  the Council procured a motor vehicle Prado VXL from a local car dealer at ZWL$27.4 million.

According to the letter dated November 30, 2021, the Minister of Local Government and Public Works authorized the Council to procure a non-locally assembled vehicle at a cost of US$109 151 which translates to ZWL$11.9 million on the date of purchase.

“However, I noted that the Council procured this vehicle at a cost of ZWL$27.4 million which translates to US$251 816 (27362400/108.666) using the RBZ mid-rate on that date.

“Council procurement records showed that another local bidder had quoted US$109 900 but was disqualified on the basis that the quote was not in ZWL$. Comparing these quotes on the same base currency showed that the Council could have saved US$141 916. This was not in line with the Ministerial approval,” the AG’s report said.

The AG warned that such actions risk compromising service delivery.

But in response,  the MCC management said the procurement of the Land Cruiser Prado was done after the granting of authority by the Permanent Secretary for Local Government.

“The price of UD$109 151 which was provided to the Minister on application was indicative so that the Minister would have an appreciation of the cost of the vehicle. The proper procurement process was duly followed through competitive bidding and the authorised model of vehicle was procured,” the management said.

They further maintained the funding which was available to procure the vehicle was the local currency; therefore our bidding document requested bidders to bid in local currency which was available.

The report also flagged out the MCC over a cocktail of other bad governance management that was not responding to audit findings raised by the Internal Auditor following the fact that  internal audit reports issued between January and September 2022 revealed that five (5) out of twenty-nine (29) reports were not responded to.

“I was not able to assess whether management implemented all 2022 full council resolutions as I was granted the status for only the first half of the year. My review of this report revealed that management implemented only fourteen (14) out of forty-nine (49) Full Council resolutions,” the AG’s report observed.

The dossier also established that just 56% of the MCC Water was billed.

The deep seated rot calls for the need of government’s urgent intervention to save the MCC citizens from the current maladministration.