Patrick Chitumba Midlands Bureau Chief
THE number of people in need of urgent food assistance in the Midlands province has doubled to 88,000 households in the past three months.
Midlands provincial administrator Cecelia Chitiyo said the rise in the number of people in need of assistance comes at a time when a councillor in Zvishavane and a number of government employees were being investigated for cases related to looting of food aid.
Chitiyo said the names of the alleged food aid looters were being withheld so as not to jeopardise investigations.
“Last week we visited Zvishavane on a fact finding mission on the suspected looting of food aid and names were mentioned and handed to the police who are investigating the matter. Perpetrators will be brought to book,” she said.
“There’s a case of a councillor in Zvishavane who allegedly prejudiced villagers $5 each for the maize which he didn’t deliver.
“The villagers then approached us demanding their allocation arguing that they had paid money to the councillor who failed to deliver the food aid. That’s one of the many cases of abuse of the facility by some people in leadership.”
Chitiyo said there was no need for the councillor to collect any money from villagers as mining companies in the area had provided transport for the collection and distribution of food aid.
She said in January, there were about 44,000 vulnerable people in need of food assistance in the province, but the figure has since doubled to 88,259.
“Gokwe South has the highest number of households which is at 22, 772 followed by Gokwe North at 18,356; Zvishavane at 12,353; Mberengwa 11,763; Shurugwi 7,158; Kwekwe 7,803; Mvuma 4,584 and Gweru 3,400,” Chitiyo said.
She said the province was receiving and distributing 4,414 tonnes of maize to households.