Jacob Mudenda: Let everybody drink porridge. If you cook porridge, you save on mill.
Nyasha: That was the Speaker of Parliament, Jacob Mudenda, speaking in Bulawayo last week. Good morning. This is the Zimbabwe News Brief from Executive AI Studio, for Monday the second of November. I'm Nyasha, an AI presenter. Today we look at next year's budget, and why every ministry will get less than it asked for. We'll also hear about civil servants' bonuses, a bumper wheat harvest and a row over water charges in Marondera. And we'll end with a school near Bulawayo that got a science lab in fourteen days.
Nyasha: We'll start with that budget. Our AI correspondent Farai has been following it.
Farai: Morning, Nyasha. Good to be here.
Farai: Parliament's pre-budget seminar in Bulawayo closed on Saturday. Ministries, departments and agencies have asked for nine hundred and seventy-four billion ZiG for next year. That's nearly three times what's available. Here's what Finance Minister Mthuli Ncube told the seminar.
Farai: He said Treasury can't meet the full nine hundred and seventy-four billion ZiG, but can meet what fits within the ceiling of three hundred and forty-seven billion.
Farai: He says there will be a haircut everywhere. Treasury runs a cash budget, spending only what it collects. And any project over two million US dollars now needs Treasury's approval, to stop new unpaid bills piling up.
Nyasha: Sorry, Farai, how did the MPs take that?
Farai: They complained during the seminar about late and erratic payments. And drought is the worry. Agriculture asked for about two hundred and fifty-five billion ZiG, against about twenty-one billion available. Parliament's agriculture committee wants thirty-three billion. And the Speaker, Jacob Mudenda, wants the budget to strengthen safety nets for what he calls a Super El Niño. Here's what he told MPs.
Jacob Mudenda: Tell the people they must start saving every bit of what they ought to eat. If we rely only on the fiscus, some people die of hunger.
Farai: So the question for the budget on the nineteenth of November is where the haircut falls, and whether the households most at risk from drought are SPARED.
Nyasha: Farai, thank you.
Nyasha: Now for the rest of the day's news. Civil servants will get their annual bonus. Mthuli Ncube says the payments will be met without difficulty. And for the first time since independence, traditional chiefs are getting bonuses too.
Farai: Now to the wheat harvest. What you're hearing is a combine harvester in a wheat field. Farmers have brought in nearly five hundred and seventy thousand tonnes, and the country is on course for at least six hundred thousand. They've been urged to finish by Friday, before the rains. Matabeleland South is ninety-three percent done.
Nyasha: In Marondera, the council wants to raise water charges by a hundred and forty-three percent, from thirty-five US cents a cubic metre to eighty-five. It says prepaid electricity at its waterworks has pushed up costs. The Marondera Residents Open Forum says people shouldn't pay more for unreliable water. Here's what Kudzanayi Masedu, a resident of Cherutombo, asked, read by an AI voice.
Kudzanayi Masedu (read by an AI voice): Firstly, is it lawful to collect water charges where that water is not being received?
Farai: Now to Bulawayo. Mayor David Coltart and his councillors toured the Geo Pomona waste plant in Harare on Thursday. He says there's no doubt Bulawayo needs a facility like it. But he told ZimLive the cost will decide. Here's how he put it.
David Coltart (read by an AI voice): The issue for us is what is on offer, what will it cost the residents of Bulawayo, and how will we afford to pay for it.
Farai: Now to the sport. Highlanders are through to the Chibuku Super Cup final. At Rufaro on Sunday, Davison Marowa put CAPS United ahead, Highlanders equalised in the eighty-second minute, and then won three-one on penalties, their goalkeeper saving two. They meet Hardrock in Kwekwe on the twenty-eighth of November.
Nyasha: Here's the weather. We couldn't read the Meteorological Services Department's forecast for today. Its last advisory expected sunny, hot weather from Friday into the weekend. So from Harare to Bulawayo and Masvingo, keep drinking water.
Nyasha: And finally, a science lab built at speed. At Sojini Secondary School in Mbembesi, outside Bulawayo, pupils now have a fully equipped science laboratory, handed over on Saturday. The South African company Afribiz Invest built it in just fourteen days, in a project led by the Zimbabwean businesswoman Zodwa Mkandla through her foundation. Nearly four hundred schoolgirls also received sanitary pads.
Nyasha: This show is brought to you by Executive AI Studio. We build AI assistants for Zimbabwean businesses. Find us at executiveai.studio.
Nyasha: Sources for every story are in the episode notes and on the episode's page. This brief was researched and written by AI. I'm Nyasha. Have a good day.
