ECONET founder Strive Masiyiwa has been summoned to appear before Parliament to give oral evidence on an issue where his company is accused of failing to pay Masvingo Municipality for leased land.
The land houses the company’s base stations.
A register of lease agreements shows that Econet has 16
base stations in Masvingo, despite that some of its lease agreements with the
municipality expired years ago.
Parliament’s Public Accounts Committee (Pac) member Dexter
Nduna (Chegutu West MP) yesterday confirmed that Masiyiwa had been summoned to
appear before Parliament.
He, however, said Pac was not on a “witchhunt”, but would
be raising issues of accountability.
The anomaly with regards to the lease agreements was
unearthed by Auditor-General (AG) Mildred Chiri’s 2019 report on local
authorities.
“Parliament is a big institution and this is the reason why
the committee seeks the input of the proprietor, not messengers (Econet bosses)
with a view that he explains the anomaly where his company is not paying for
that leased land. The AG exposed this and the committee has gone further to try
and find out what has been happening and how this is happening,” Nduna told
NewsDay.
He said Pac would find out what exactly transpired and
recover the money.
Section 299 of the Constitution confers Pac with unlimited
oversight powers over State and council’s financial activities.
Of Econet’s 16 lease agreements in Masvingo, one of them
for Lot 75 Rujeko B base station measuring 180 square metres has expired.
Lot 5 lease agreement was signed on August 1, 2017 and
expires on July 31, 2022.
Other lease agreements such as that for Lot 7 Don Bosco
Primary School and Lot 8 Flamboyant Hotel base stations signed in January 2014
have no expiry dates.
“We are seeing revenue leakages in the form of underhand
dealings. We are seeing proliferation of Econet base stations and we shudder to
think if this (not paying council) is also not happening in other towns,” Nduna
said. Newsday
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