By Kibo Ngowi

What does it look like to close the feedback loop between citizens and authorities to ensure people-powered accountability? That’s the question we’ve been asking for the last seven years starting in Nepal after the devastating 2015 earthquake when we established the Mobile Citizen Helpdesks with a vision of galvanizing volunteers to bridge the information gap and respond to the unfolding humanitarian crisis. 

Since then the program has been renamed Civic Action Teams (CivActs) and evolved to address a variety of challenges such as migration, human trafficking, inclusion and elections across the several countries where we operate including in Liberia, Nigeria and Mali. Starting in 2020, Accountability Lab Zimbabwe (ALZ) has been applying the CivActs framework in four locations, two within Harare – Glenview and Mbare – along with one in Bulawayo and another in Goromonzi.

Through the CivActs campaign, communities select volunteers known as Community Frontline Associates (CFAs) who gather information through town hall meetings and surveys on critical problems affecting their communities on a monthly basis. They then relay this information to our teams at the Lab to coordinate with local and national power holders. The ALZ team has been working with community organizations such as Amandla Centre for Development and National Association of Youth Organizations (NAYO) to build closer relationships with residents in the selected areas.

The issue of housing insecurity emerged as a major source of concern for residents of Mbare through town hall meetings and other engagements. “The number of people who have their houses taken away from them is growing,” says Jokoniah Mawopa, a CFA in Mbare. “The issue is that these houses do not have title deeds. If the Council could be pressured to issue title deeds in a way that is fair and transparent that would help solve a lot of problems.”

“I have lived in Mbare for 32 years,” says Rebecca Machangara, an Mbare resident who occupies a room with her family in the area’s Matapi flats. The flats are part of a government low-cost housing program started by the British colonial government. Originally constructed to accommodate government workers, most are single rooms, built for one person, but now mostly occupied by larger families. Though poorly maintained, many who rent them do so because they are more affordable than other rented accommodations across Harare.

“Last year we started to receive eviction letters despite the fact that we were regularly paying our rent to the landlord and I reached out to Amandla for help. They were able to solve the issue but a few months later the landlord started to send eviction letters again. Anytime we pay our rent late by even a few days they start threatening to evict us but for those of us like myself who get paid on the 12th and have piling debts we cannot always pay on time.”

To make matters worse, there have been several cases of citizens being scammed into renting or buying illegal land, only to have their homes demolished by municipalities as they do not meet building and Council regulations. A survey ALZ produced in partnership with NAYO revealed that there is a growing problem of land barons – individuals or corporate entities that are involved in corrupt land dealings that leave the end-buyer in possession of illegal land. 

35% of survey respondents had fallen victim to land barons and had been sold land illegally while 78% said they knew someone who was sold land illegally by land barons and an overwhelming 94% did not feel that authorities had taken enough action against residential land corruption. Land is a major issue in Harare. The Zimbabwean government has a program in which aspiring homeowners pay an annual amount so the government can allocate them land to construct a house but the current waiting list is about 800,000, an increase from 151,000 in 2019.

Mavis Banda, another CFA in Mbare was involved in a particular case where her team was able to advocate for an elderly woman whose house had been taken away from her by a tenant. “Gladys Ndlovu was recovering from an accident that left her with a broken leg where she could get assistance from her family,” Mavis explains. “She left a tenant who paid rent for the first few months but then took advantage of the owner’s absence and claimed ownership of the house.” 

“After about a year the owner came back to Harare only to find that her house had been taken away from her. She was chased away and forced to stay by the entrance stairs of the hostels on the ground floor with her clothes in a sack.” Fortunately, the woman learned about the work ALZ was doing in the community and reached out to them for help. 

Through investigation it emerged that the tenant had worked with a council official to illegally change ownership of the elderly woman’s property to that of the tenant. She was abused and her property destroyed. The CFAs engaged the department of social welfare and also pushed the council to reinstate her in her house. It resulted in a directive from the president’s office to reinstate the woman’s property.

It’s the deep connections ALZ has made to residents through their CFAs and partner organizations in Mbare that allow them to identify these stories and advocate on behalf of vulnerable residents. Broader changes will certainly need to be made to the availability of land and property and the regulations governing them but successes like the one above demonstrate how the CivActs model can be used to effect change in peoples’ lives.

Kibo Ngowi is the Marketing & Communications Officer for Accountability Lab

Kibo Ngowi