The role of local authorities in promoting decent work is little understood and has been absent
from both policy and practice (GIAN, 2005). The purpose of this interdisciplinary study was
to identify and describe the existing and potential roles of Bulawayo City in fostering decent
work in the construction sector, urban development and related services through policy
making, strategic planning and project activities. The study outcomes will contribute to the
shared knowledge among local authorities and other stakeholders at the local and international
levels.
Bulawayo is Zimbabwe’s second largest urban settlement with a 2002 population close to 7
00 000 i.e. 6% of the national population or 20% of the urban population (CSO, 2002:21), a
budget of Z$619 million in 1993/94 (Ndubiwa and Hamilton, 1994), Z$2.5 billion in 2000 and
Z$797 billion in 20051
. The research team collected national and local level secondary data
on decent work variables with a view to compile decent work indicators to help compare
Bulawayo City against national and global conditions. Such data was sought from the Central
Statistical Office (CSO), the National Social Security Authority (NSSA), employer and
worker organisations, construction firms, research institutions and Bulawayo City itself. Key
informants in all these institutions were interviewed using a semi-structured questionnaire and
grey literature related to decent work was identified and collected where feasible.
While Zimbabwe is not ‘statistics poor’, statistics collected from the institutions cited above
are not in formats suitable to answer descent work questions. The political-economic crisis in
the country and in particular the government’s frosty relations with the UK, the EU the USA
and the white Commonwealth (GoZ, 2005: 25c), have compounded conditions of insecurity
for most institutions and individuals; making even the release to outsiders of routine
administrative information for research purposes a sensitive affair. Increasingly, key
informants were not prepared to release information unless there was a direct financial benefit
to themselves or their organisations. It is in this context of economic crisis and tense relations
that some in the west have expressed doubts regarding the accuracy of employment, economic
and population statistics; alleging that these are manipulated to suit the ruling party. Further,
high population movements and the ‘informalization’ of the economy since mid 1990s have
left significant socio-economic activities outside the data frameworks of institutions such as
the CSO and NSSA. Thus lack of informal sector data is the main limitation of this study