Councilors seek amendment of LCC, Parkrite contract

Thu, 06 Apr 2017 10:44:28 +0000

By KALOBWE BWALYA

THE Finance and Legal Affairs committees of the Lusaka City Council (LCC) have been challenged by councilors to go back and scrutinise the draft working contract between Parkrite Zambia concerning the Memorandum of Agreement (MoA) because the Council is not benefiting much from the parking management.

The councilors have demanded that the Council should engage Parkrite and agree on the sharing of the revenues on gross takings, instead of net profits which was at 30 percent and other contentious clauses in the MoA.

This came to light during the joint Finance, Valuation and Commercial undertakings and Legal Services committee at council meeting in Lusaka yesterday at which councilors questioned the accountability of the money realised from the two partners.

In February 2017 Parkrite Zambia said it made over K900, 000 over a period of three months.

Parkrite Chief Executive Officer Withls Masunda said his firm netted a total of K970, 000 from last year to January, this year.

Mr. Masunda said in November K180, 000 was realised while in December, it collected K270, 000 and K500, 000 was netted in January.

He disclosed that the amount was achieved through the 5,000 available parking spaces as well as a minimal ones found at Kamwala second class trading area.

And Mtendere Ward 30 Watson Mtonga was concerned that Parkrite has taken almost all parking spaces including Shoprite, Kulima Tower, Soweto market among other areas.

“Parkrite has not performed well compared to LCC but for them to show interest, they know that they will make more profit because they increased the charges from K2.00 to K5.00. And Parkrite was given only Cairo road as testing study on pilot project but has taken all parking spaces in the CBD,” said Mr Mtonga.

But Lusaka Mayor Wilson Kalumba said that Parkrite was not collecting revenues in all income points such as reserved parking areas which the Council had already collected in advance.

Meanwhile, Lusaka Town Clerk Alex Mwansa said no cohesion was made in the contract with Parkrite Zambia, so the LCC was free to make amendments in the MoA.

According to the draft contract between Parkrite and LCC, it was agreed that in an event of any dispute, the aggrieved party should notify the offending party in writing of the grievance raised and seek immediate remedy within seven days if reasonably possible to do so.