Mr Motsi

Lloyd Gumbo Senior Reporter
The Public Service Commission has redeployed six provincial lands officers in a move seen as a response to allegations of corruption in land allocations raised by the Ministry of Lands and Rural Resettlement in the provinces.

The ministry has been investigating lands officers who were allegedly demanding payment from people seeking to be allocated land.

The six officers have been redeployed to other ministries, with former Mashonaland West provincial lands officer Mr Lovemore Vambe being appointed Chief Training Officer at Agritex while Mr Wilfred Motsi (Mashonaland East) is now a Chief Environment Officer at the Ministry of Environment, Water and Climate.

Mr Shoko

Former Midlands provincial lands officer Mr Joseph Shoko is also a Chief Environment Officer at the Ministry of Environment, Water and Climate while Mr Roomies Mthimukhulu (Matabeleland South) is now the Chief Planning Officer in Matabeleland North Province.

Mr Gerald Chirapa (Mashonaland Central) is now a chief planning officer in the Ministry of Agriculture, Mechanisation and Irrigation Development while Mr Nixon Kutsaranga (Manicaland) is now the Chief Planning Officer in Mashonaland East Province.

Masvingo and Matabeleland North provinces were not affected because they do not have substantive provincial lands officers.

Lands and Rural Resettlement Minister Dr Douglas Mombeshora confirmed the development yesterday, but insisted it was just a routine exercise by the PSC.

“They were removed by the Public Service Commission and deployed somewhere else and not the Ministry of Lands and Rural Resettlement,” Dr Mombeshora said.

He declined to comment on whether his ministry had requested the PSC to remove them, referring further questions to Lands and Rural Resettlement permanent secretary, Ambassador Grace Mutandiri.

Ambassador Mutandiri said there was nothing unusual about the re-deployment.

“They are civil servants so it’s perfectly normal that they are moved because overstaying at one place is not healthy.

“Actually some of them had overstayed. So they have been removed because the exercise was long overdue,” she said.

She also declined to comment on whether the redeployment was influenced by reports of corruption levelled against provincial land officers.

“Remember I am coming from diplomacy, so I will not discuss my officers with the media. I only discuss that with the employer,” she said.

One of the deployed officers, Mr Shoko said their re-assignment was normal.

“This is just restructuring and this is what was in our letters of re-deployment. If there are other reasons of corruption that you are talking about, they did not tell us.

“They are appropriately re-deploying us depending on one’s area of expertise. In fact we welcome the re-deployment because we are gaining experience in various fields,” said Mr Shoko.

However, last year, Minister Mombeshora confirmed that there had been numerous cases and complaints against land officers who illegally allocated land in return for money.

He said as a result, Government mandated the National Land Inspectorate to receive and investigate reports on land-related corruption.

Minister Mombeshora said several district administrators and headmen had also been implicated in corrupt land activities with some of them having appeared at various courts facing charges of corruptly allocating land.

A number of district administrators have appeared in court over corruption in land matters, with Chegutu District Administrator Makanzwei Jecheche being sentenced to a year in prison last year after soliciting $9 000 from a land seeker from Harare.