Sources privy to the publication reveals that the Lilongwe City Council authorities have reshuffled some of its key staff and directors in various directorate as one way of ensuring efficiency and effective service delivery.
According to the source, the recent shake follows a key staff performance appraisal exercise effected in response to the feedback collected from the capital city dwellers.
The source disclosed that the unprecedented levels of underperformance by most directorates were going out of hand as all the directors were on permanent position except for the Chief Executive Officer was on contract.
“The above development was a breeding ground for sabotage, the directors could do as it pleases since their safety was guaranteed, by the end of the day it was the CEO who was paying the price” said our source.
Some of the city council officers we spoke to also collaborated with the source adding that the fresh shakeup may likely meet heavy resistance from other quarters since some of the affected individuals have served and stayed on senior positions for close to 30 years.
However, the decision to move some offices is touted to bring huge impact on the future undertakings in the city and lead to quality service delivery to the city dwellers.
A probe into the performance appraisal report shows yawning gaps in the directories such as finance, commerce, legal, planning, health and public works.
For example, the finance directorate is failing to pay December salaries for some city council employees and that suppliers no longer have interest to do business with the council due to non-payment of goods and services delivered.
Also, commerce department is marred with incidences of officers directing city revenue into personal pockets as well asunder collection for no apparent reason and justification.
The report shows that the planning and development directorate has been deliberately frustrated developers dude to selfish interests of some officers, in addition to unnecessary delays in approval. Officers in the directorate have further been found to have set up parallel approval systems between the subordinates and the directorate resulting in approvals that do not bring revenue to the council but rather individuals.
Similarly, the report indicates that the legal directorate has scored the lowest during the appraisal and it further reveals that the council is suffocating due to huge court damages.
Under health directorate, the report shows deplorable sanitation, very slow to act, and that the city is turning into garbage center.
With regard to public works directorate, the report indicates that there is poor state of the road when each road has a dedicated contractor.
