Bulawayo council strick clashes with trade fair

primer display during last year s trade fair.

THE Zimbabwe International Trade Fair got underway in Bulawayo on Tuesday in the middle of a strike by council workers over unpaid salaries.

Burst water pipes were not being attended to; rubbish lay uncollected and council-run clinics were turning patients away after the 3,200 workers walked out on Monday and Tuesday.Council workers were due to be paid on Monday, but Bulawayo is broke – just one of 12 urban councils that are in salary arrears.

There was no significant disruption on the Trade Fair which opened briskly with all space taken, as the country’s premier business exhibition recaptured its former glory.

Council bosses were locked in meetings with unions in a bid to resolve the strike on Tuesday – aware that the breakdown in service delivery could snowball into a full-blown crisis before the fair concludes on Saturday night.

This year’s ZITF has seen the return of European countries after a decade of boycott, but China – fast becoming Zimbabwe’s biggest trade partner – is sending the highest number of foreign exhibitors.

Italy, Poland and Germany are the three European countries represented at the exhibition. Zimbabwe’s neighbours South Africa, Malawi, Botswana, Mozambique and Zambia were also heavily represented.