Hwange Local Board together with Hwange Rural District Council met South Africa’s Ba Phalaborwa Municipality in Hwange last week to discuss areas of cooperation between the three local authorities and how to possibly enter into a twinning agreement.
The South African delegation, led by Ba Phalaborwa Municipality Mayor Cllr Merriam Malatji, toured both the urban and rural local authorities’ projects and expressed how the 2 countries could benefit from the twinning agreement. Among the projects visited there was a site where HLB aims to build a civic center, quarry and new offices for the council, and under the HRDC, a baobab fruit processing which is spearheaded by women.
“We have realized some similar aspects between Hwange and Ba Phalaborwa, an indication that the twinning initiative will be seamless and plausible. We also appreciate the differences identified and look forward to learning from one another in an effort to come up with best practices to achieve the common goal of sustainable development in our communities.” Cllr Malatji said
Ba Phalaborwa’s municipality manager, Dr. Kgoshi Lucas Pilusa, who was also part of the delegation, noted that for development to take place there is a need to share notes and note down best practices that can be adopted. “We realized that we can’t rely on mining, that’s why we end up having ghost towns. That’s why we are here (Hwange), to learn about tourism and share notes on that.”
Hwange RDC chief executive officer Mr. P Ncube also indicated how this partnership would benefit all parties and increase service delivery. He said, “The purpose of this event was to strengthen relationships between the three local authorities and to identify areas of cooperation with the view of improving service delivery. If we have our counterparts coming here from Ba Phalaborwa and we identify areas or gaps for example in tourism, we can then have investors coming in from that end or other areas.”