Bindura Municipality’s Failure to Provide Services Promotes Females Harassment – WCOZ

Bindura town women and young girls have challenged the local municipality to provide street lighting, especially in the high-density suburbs amid reports they are being raped and facing many other forms of sexual harassment when walking during late and dark night hours.

With youths on drugs increasing each day, walking at night in the streets of Chipadze for women is now a recipe for disaster.

However for many women, there is no better option, they have to walk in those dark hours.

The municipality has been failing to avail water to ratepayers for months now. Women are facing the task of finding water wherever they can. They are forced to wake up as early as 3 am to go to a few public water points in their residential areas, under darkness again exposing themselves to muggers.

As the Women’s Coalition of Zimbabwe began its awareness campaigns against gender-based violence in observation of the 16 Days of Activism Against GBV last Saturday, calls for efficient services provision were again amplified.

The municipality represented by councillor Patrick Masango (Zanu PF) promised to bring changes but encouraged the same people to pay their services bills. He said the council is eager to provide efficient services but ratepayers need to cooperate as they are not paying their bills.

“We, however, have a well-wisher whom l cannot mention right now, who has pledged to install solar-powered street lights from Chipadze (mukuyu area) to Chiwaridzo and the deal is likely to be fruitful next year, walking in darkness would be over.

“Regarding water provision, we are working on erecting a pipeline from Masembura Dam straight to our water works station.”

“Currently we are banking on Mwenje Dam but, farmers have been tempering with pipes and also diverting the flow of the river the same with artisanal miners, thereby affecting supplies here. We are working day and night to bring back sanity,” said Cllr Masango.

The meeting also saw the Bindura University of Science Education female students raising complaints against some of their lecturers whom they alleged of demanding sexual favours for better marks.

A number of the students said lecturers were demanding conjugal favours from them for better marks.

Other students also called for separate student buses. They said they were being forcefully grabbed and fondled during that period when they stampeded to get onto the college bus.

Speaking at the same meeting, Gillian Chinzete a renowned local women’s rights activist and provincial WCOZ chairperson advised students who are facing sexual demands from their lecturers to record their messages and report them to senior college officials as well as women’s rights advocate groups.

She encouraged them to stand their ground and to refuse any form of bullying from their mentors.

The Women’s Coalition of Zimbabwe is a local non-governmental organisation advocating for the promotion of human rights with a bias towards women’s rights.

The coalition shall be holding gender-based violence awareness campaigns throughout December and yonder until women and young girls are fairly treated like their male counterparts.