Concerns Mount Over Lack of Transparency in Geo Pomona’s National Rollout

Geo Pomona Waste Management, the company at the center of a contentious deal to manage Harare’s waste, has revealed plans to expand its operations across Zimbabwe’s provinces—despite having no formal agreements with local authorities outside the capital.

The company’s executive chairman and CEO, Dilesh Nguwaya, announced the ambitious expansion during a recent visit to Belarus, where Geo Pomona signed a Memorandum of Understanding with the Belarusian government to acquire waste management trucks and equipment, reportedly under a Zimbabwe government-facilitated deal.

“We’re scaling up what we started in Harare to the rest of the country,” Nguwaya said, emphasizing that the goal is to oversee solid waste collection across all ten provinces. “Geo Pomona is stepping up to manage waste nationally.”

However, critics say the move raises red flags—primarily because the company has not secured contracts with other local councils, and because the rollout appears to be proceeding without public tenders, thanks to what Nguwaya described as “Cabinet authority” granted in 2022.

Geo Pomona’s entry into the waste sector was controversial from the outset. The company was awarded a 30-year contract by the Ministry of Local Government in 2022 to run Harare’s Pomona waste site and convert garbage to energy. Under the deal, Harare was obligated to deliver a minimum of 550 tonnes of refuse daily in the first year—rising to 1,000 tonnes by 2027—with fixed payments running into tens of millions of US dollars annually, even if the city failed to meet delivery targets.

The city council initially resisted the agreement, arguing it had not been involved in the procurement process. When Harare failed to pay the $40 per tonne charge imposed by Geo Pomona, the central government took over payments—deducting the funds from the city’s devolution budget, effectively redirecting public money to cover a deal it did not negotiate.

Now, with a nationwide expansion on the horizon, observers fear that other municipalities may face similar bypassing of local governance structures, with central government potentially imposing the same model countrywide.

Nguwaya, a known associate of President Emmerson Mnangagwa’s son, was previously implicated in corruption allegations involving COVID-19 medical procurement through another of his companies, Drax International. Although the courts later cleared him of wrongdoing, the controversy continues to cast a shadow over his business dealings.

Analysts warn that Geo Pomona’s expansion could mark the beginning of a centralized, non-transparent control over municipal services—sidestepping local authorities and competitive procurement. There are growing calls for clarity on how the company was awarded authority to roll out nationwide waste services, especially in the absence of council tenders or public consultations.

“If local authorities are excluded from waste management decisions, it undermines the principles of devolution and local accountability,” said one urban governance expert.

As new trucks and equipment are expected to arrive from Belarus in the coming months, Geo Pomona’s reach may soon extend far beyond Harare—raising critical questions about transparency, governance, and who ultimately benefits from Zimbabwe’s public service contracts.