President Robert Mugabe

MEMBERS of the Zimbabwe National Liberation War Veterans Association (ZNLWVA) are seeking another crisis indaba with their former patron, President Robert Mugabe before the end of the year over their unmet demands.
The highly irritable ex-combatants had a meeting with the President on April 7 this year, their first in 20 years, where they presented a long list of grievances.
They had last met him in 1996 when they were demanding compensation for participating in the 1970s liberation war that helped bring the country’s independence in 1980.
During the April meeting, the war veterans asked for tax exemptions, allocation of some shares in the country’s blue chip companies and the sacking of ZANU-PF national political commissar, Saviour Kasukuwere, among some of their demands.
President Mugabe wholly ignored their demands, prompting them to request for yet another meeting with him in July which was not granted.
In anger and frustration, they held their own meeting at which they announced that they were withdrawing their support for the veteran politician.
A stinging communiqué critical of ZANU-PF leadership that was released on the day of the meeting led to the ZNLWVA executive being expelled from the ruling party and subsequently arrested for undermining the authority of the President.
Their case, however, failed to stick at the Harare Magistrate Court after the State failed to get any witnesses.
They have since been removed from remand and are back with further demands.
They claim that now that they are out of ZANU-PF, they can speak their minds more freely, hence their latest demands.
ZNLWVA national spokesman, Douglas Mahiya, lifted the lid this week on their latest demands in an exclusive interview with the Financial Gazette.
He said war veterans wanted to meet the President primarily over deteriorating standards of living in the country.
“The President must come to us without any intermediaries. We want to talk together and we want to agree or disagree. We seek closure. If we are to part ways forever, then so be it,” said Mahiya, violently throwing his arms around the begrimed office in some building in central Harare.
It’s a small room furnished by a small common rectangular desk and four plastic chairs.
The office is used by an organisation known as widows of war veterans.
Following the conversation were four others, two of them fellow war veterans who kept nodding throughout the interview.
The other two were women, roughly in their late fifties or early sixties, only introduced to us as widows of war veterans.
One was carefully slicing a cucumber which was to be served later on during the interview.
“We want to sit down with him so that we understand where the compasses have gone wrong,” he shouted as if addressing pedestrians strutting on the street two stories below.
War veterans, said Mahiya, want President Mugabe to explain if the money he recently gave to the Ministry of War Veterans, War Collaborators, Detainees and Restrictees was meant to fund the toppling of their executive and replace it with the one led by Manicaland Provincial Affairs Minister, Mandi Chimene.
ZNLWVA are adamant that the money was provided to fund activities aimed at ousting them; claims which Tapfumaneyi has since vehemently refuted.
“We want to know what the US$3,5 million was meant for because as we speak, school fees for our children have not been paid for four terms and if we do not see them getting paid in January, we will know it was abused,” he retorted, fizz forming on either corner of his mouth.
He said they would soon approach secretary for war veterans’ affairs in ZANU-PF, Sydney Sekeramayi, to arrange the meeting with President Mugabe.
“We hope Sekeramayi will raise it with the President. This time, we do not want anyone to come between us. We want to hear directly from him and him to hear directly from us. We want to talk frankly. We are now out of ZANU-PF and we can frankly say our hearts out without fear.
“We think people at the Ministry (of war veterans) are fighting us and so we don’t want them anywhere nearer (the meeting with President Mugabe). We therefore do not want any money committed to that meeting. We don’t want government to commit its money. We can go there on our own as we have done before,” he said, casting his eyes towards the two men who, now munching cucumber chunks, respond by nodding their heads in total agreement.
He did not hide the war veterans’ desire to see Kasukuwere being removed from the commissariat office, repeating their now familiar chorus: “He is not qualified for that office. It’s suitable only for occupation by someone with liberation war credentials, someone who knows the party ideology. We currently have 34 000 members in the association. All of them qualify.”
He said the ZNLWA was transforming itself from being a ZANU-PF affiliate into a pressure group that stands for the welfare of the Zimbabwean citizens, adding that they would now never join any other party.
“As war veterans, we are not going to join another political party, but we will tell political parties the ethos and values of the revolution to which they should conform. We call upon ZANU-PF and government to go back to the basics,” he charged.
Interestingly, the demand for a fresh indaba comes after they recently amended their constitution.
Among other things, they elected to do away with the position of patron, which President Mugabe has occupied since the inception of the ZNLWVA in the late 1990s.
While in public they have claimed they no longer have anything to do with ZANU-PF, their undying affection for the 92-year-old leader and the ruling party has, however, left many confused.

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President Robert Mugabe

LISTENING to both President Robert Mugabe’s State of the Nation Address (SONA) and Finance and Economic Development Minister Patrick Chinamasa’s 2017 National Budget presentation last week, many were left wondering what to make of the two.
The SONA, presented two days ahead of the budget, was perhaps meant to inform and set the tone for Chinamasa.
Addressing a joint sitting of Parliament, President Mugabe delivered a speech full of hope and pregnant with optimism, never mind a swarm of critics that dismissed it as a fantasy divorced from reality.
Forty eight hours later, Chinamasa strode into the same august House and, in the presence of his superiors; he presented a gloomy economic outlook full of chilling suggestions such as further taxation on airtime vouchers.
The tax was veiled as a health levy.
Where his superior predicted an economic boom, Chinamasa revised downwards the economic growth for 2017 to a 1,7 percent from the 2016 projection of 2,7 percent.
While SONA did not address the contentious issue of civil servants salaries and bonuses, Chinamasa cleverly put it across by simply stating that government was running on unsustainable expenditure, with the wage bill now rising to 95 percent of revenue.
He left it like that, knowing how President Mugabe has on two occasions overruled his decision to stop bonus payments and slash salaries by a good margin of 20 percent.
Not that Chinamasa had the most brilliant budget; far from it.
It was probably more off-putting than SONA, which was good fodder for government critics following its presentation.
The criticisms that SONA received probably summed up Zimbabweans’ general impression towards their leadership — uninspiring.
And, as expected, the usual suspects coming in the form of disappointed political analysts, political opponents and social commentators, dug into the speech in the same manner that hungry vultures dismantle a large carcass.
Although SONA was not a wholesome disaster because it addressed a number of important issues such as improving the ease of doing business, sourcing and distribution of farming inputs and measures to curb gender based violence, critics still found more than enough reason to trash it.
The reactions were wide and diverse, but all collapsing into one common denominator: That SONA was far removed from the actual state that the nation is currently in.
“In the past (President) Mugabe had the capacity to deceive brilliantly; now he is just an emperor with no clothes and nothing to offer,” wrote former Cabinet minister, David Coltart, now an outspoken government critic on micro blogging site twitter.
Another former minister, Tendai Biti, who served along with Coltart in the inclusive government era, also waded in, posting on twitter: “Tired, exhausted, spineless, 45 minute (it was actually 31 minutes) rumbling that did not inspire nor offer any solution or meaningful insight on the State of the nation.”
Such has been the case of Zimbabwe, where anything the leadership tries to do, even in good faith, is met with serious scepticism and has missiles and salvos fired at it from all directions.

Finance Minister Patrick Chinamasa before presenting the 2017 National Budget last Thursday.

The general consensus was that if it was to be fairly analysed, SONA was a huge let-down, which did not address the real state of this nation.
Many analysts described it as a mere collection of what respective ministries were doing, or not doing.
Even so, the address was more about optimistic economic projections that were utterly not in sync with the reality on the ground.
For example, SONA proclaimed that a boom witnessed in the tourism sector continued to grow, adding that government was now expecting arrivals to hit 2,5 million by year end after 902 435 tourists reportedly came to Zimbabwe during the first half of the year.
How is it possible to lure 1,6 million tourists in the dying weeks of the year, when the country only managed a fraction of that in 11 months, is debate for another day.
“The true state of the nation is that our tourism figures are embarrassing, and that if we had any shame, we would just not bother talking about them,” opined political analyst, Alexander Rusero.
“During the course of the year, we saw hotels closing because there are no visitors booking the rooms. If we are receiving those huge amounts of tourists, then where are they sleeping,” he asked rhetorically.
SONA completely ignored the most talked about issue at the moment: The liquidity crisis which today sees citizens spending long hours in winding bank queues for petite withdrawals that are not worthy the endurance.
Nor was there any mention of the contentious bond notes that were ostensibly introduced as an export incentive, but have crept into account holders who hardly know what the whole export hullabaloo is all about.
People generally expected the president to address this ominous issue, but he didn’t.
Instead, the most pressing national issue at the moment was placed under the blanket of “all manner of economic hardships”, with the travailing populace being saluted for enduring such.
This left many wondering if the government truly has an appreciation of the degree of the suffering that the public is enduring.
SONA, thus, melted down into a squandered chance for the ZANU-PF government to pacify the agitated citizens or inspire younger generations who feel their future is in jeopardy.
How, for example, does a state of the nation fail to address glaring social woes such as crumpling State hospitals that have stopped executing some of their most basic duties like carrying out corrective surgeries for lack of equipment and pain killers?
Only this week, the Zimbabwe National Water Authority released damning statistics showing that major dams on which government is pinning its hopes for the success of the command agriculture programme do not have water.
And, in addition to the usual water challenges being faced in all the country’s urban areas, there is a huge possibility that the programme might fail if the dams that provide the much needed irrigation water do not fill up on time.
The forecasted heavy rains that had prompted government to devise the command agriculture maize production scheme have been slow in coming, and the agriculture season is marching on.

Former Finance Minister Tendai Biti

Watchers argued that the optimism that was shown so prevalently in the address is a big yawn from reality.
Said political commentator, Rashweat Mukundu: “No critical national issues were addressed. It was just a repetition of Zim-Asset (Zimbabwe Agenda for Sustainable Socio-Economic Transformation) issues, while economic indicators are pointing in a certain directive, they say the opposite. This is downright disingenuous on the part of government. SONA induced neither hope nor confidence in the public.”
Japhet Moyo, secretary general of the Zimbabwe Congress of Trade Unions, was disappointed that the address was mum on runaway unemployment, which is threatening to top 90 percent.
“We are not even sure that jobs will still be there, come 2017. People are being forced to use bond notes and some are going without meals, yet (President) Mugabe says the economy is recovering. His government cannot simply pay workers. What kind of recovery is that,” Moyo asked.
Opposition political parties also grabbed the opportunity to lash out at government.
Movement for Democratic Change (MDC-T) spokesman, Obert Gutu, described SONA as a dump squib.
“Instead of addressing critical issues such as the grinding poverty that is afflicting at least 75 percent of the Zimbabwean population in both rural and urban areas, rampant unemployment particularly amongst the youth and the financial disaster that has been caused by the decision to introduce bond notes into the financial market, SONA was bereft of details on concrete and sustainable measures and policies to resuscitate the comatose economy,” he wrote.
People’s Democratic Party spokesperson, Jacob Mafume, touted: “You can no longer make sense of the policy positions that are announced by the government.”
In real terms, one needs not peruse the SONA speech to get the true state of the nation, which says government imported large quantities of maize to feed people, they need to visit villages where people are starving and little girls are dropping out of school to take up sex work to escape poverty.
The true state of Zimbabwe is realised when one travels to Beitbridge to see hundreds of people risking life and limb crossing the great crocodile-infested Limpopo River to beat the much lauded Statutory Instrument number 64 which banned imports.
To realise the true state of the nation, one may need to move around the filthy slums and crammed streets of any city or town that have been invaded by vendors, some with one-month-old babies strapped on their backs, selling all sorts of things.
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Acting town clerk, Josephine Ncube

JOSTLING for the Harare City Council (HCC) town clerk position has again returned to town house following a recent government directive ordering the municipality to fill all vacant senior managerial posts.
According to council sources, the latest race involves current acting town clerk, Josephine Ncube and human capital director, Cainos Chingombe.
The task of filling up the town clerk position has, for the past one -and-half-years, been tangled up in controversy following the acrimonious departure of the previous town clerk, Tendai Mahachi, who was forced to retire having reached retirement age.
The post was advertised mid last year and a record 145 candidates, including Ncube and Chingombe, applied. Former banker, James Mushore, landed the post, albeit for a few months. His appointment was immediately reversed by Local Government, Public Works and National Housing Minister, Saviour Kasukuwere, who alleged that HCC authorities had breached the Urban Councils Act by not seeking approval from the Local Government Board to appoint Mushore.
Although the matter is still in the courts, where Mushore is arguing that he was lawfully appointed, Kasukuwere has given council a three-month ultimatum to fill up all vacant senior positions, setting the stage for a spirited showdown between Ncube and Chingombe.
Chingombe was a rank outsider in last year’s selection process after failing to get to the final eight short-listed candidates.
Ncube made it to the last eight, but later fell by the wayside in the tight race for the US$10 000 salary per month job.
Chingombe has reportedly laun-ched an aggressive canvassing drive, having allegedly visited several departments during the period when he was acting town clerk.
Chingombe became the acting town clerk after Ncube was suspended last month for failing to comply with a government directive compelling city bosses to cut their salaries.
Interestingly, he did not last long as acting town clerk as he was also suspended for the same reasons.
The two resumed duty recently after Kasukuwere, lifted their suspensions.
Council directors, including Chingombe, are still getting obscene salaries two years after government put a US$6 000 cap on management salaries.
According to sources at Town House, Chingombe is said to have been telling employees that he was on course for the top job.
“He left employees really surprised after carrying out a large-scale campaign, which many did not anticipate,” said one senior HCC employee who requested anonymity.
When contacted for comment, Chingombe told the Financial Gazette that he was in a meeting and would return the call.
“Let me call you after some time; I am currently in a meeting,” he said.
He, however, did not return the call and was also not picking subsequent calls.
He also appeared to ignore messages sent to his mobile phone.
Ncube declined to comment.
“I have no comment to make about things that happened during my absence,” she said.
Harare mayor, Bernard Manyenyeni, said council was not in the process of recruiting a new town clerk because they were waiting for the matter of suspended town clerk, Mushore, to be resolved by the courts.
He acknowledged that there could be serious canvassing.
“No such process has commenced, but I cannot rule out canvassing,” he said.
“Nothing has changed. We are still waiting for the courts (to decide on Mushore’s fate),” he added.
The Harare town clerk position has historically been contentious.
In 2007, the then chairperson of a commission running the affairs of the city, Sekesai Makwavarara, fought a protracted battle with the then town clerk, Nomutsa Chideya as she sought to get rid of him.
Chideya, now late, would later leave the job unceremoniously.
He was succeeded by Mahachi who had been hired three years earlier as a turnaround strategist.
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Zimbabwe Republic Police spokesperson, Charity Charamba

MASSIVE social upheaval looms in Harare after the Harare City Council (HCC) resolved to evict thousands of illegal settlers who have invaded large swathes of open spaces in the capital city.
This follows a recent investigation by the local authority’s Housing, Education, Health and Community Services committee, which discovered that illegal land occupation of Harare’s open spaces had grown to unacceptable levels despite efforts to curb the scourge.
The committee found out that there were 14 new cases of land invasions in October alone.
It also found out that the illegal settlers were further encroaching into council farms located on the outskirts of the city.
The invasions took place between June and July this year at Ingwe, Crowborough and Churu farms, where serious health concerns have been raised because the farms are principally reserved for cattle breeding, and are irrigated by sewerage water.
In addition to the farm invasions, council has noted that other areas reserved for different purposes have also been illegally occupied.
A recent full council meeting resolved that the invaders be driven out.
“The committee noted that there were 14 new land invasion cases in October in Dzivaresekwa, Mufakose, Budiriro, Glen View, Glen Norah and Kuwadzana,” reads part of a report compiled by the housing committee chaired by Resias Masunda.
The Financial Gazette understands that after realising that it is being overwhelmed by the situation, council has enlisted the services of the Zimbabwe Republic Police (ZRP) to help it drive out the settlers.
Minutes of a meeting of the housing committee held on November 24, 2016 partly read: “The director of housing and social development further reported that all the new land invasions had been reported to the police for prosecution and 48-hour notices were served to the invaders. The majority of the invaders are still on site despite the notices, hence the need for urgent enforcement action from council and ZRP.”
City of Harare spokesman, Michael Chideme, confirmed the developments.
“They (land invaders) were given 48-hour notices to vacate the areas they illegally occupied. We do not know when the eviction will happen, but it won’t be long,” he said.
Concerning those settled on council farms, Chideme said the local authority would not compromise on their position of evicting all those who have invaded its farms.
“There is a clear division between human settlements and the farms to protect residents from the dangers associated with waste water,” said Chideme.
Council, which is seeking to revive the farms following years of neglect, recently warned it would soon destroy all the illegally-built structures on its farms to pave way for it to build new sewer ponds.
The warnings have, however, fallen on deaf ears.
ZRP national spokesperson, Charity Charamba, said she was not aware of the impending evictions.
The decision to evict the illegal settlers is likely to attract serious backlash from human rights groups, especially given that the illegal settlers would most likely not be given alternative pieces of land.
At law, no person can be evicted from a piece of land they have settled on for at least 30 days unless alternative land is provided.
And if carried out during the current rainfall season council would have to contend with an even louder outcry.
During a visit to Kuwadzana and Budiriro at the weekend, the Financial Gazette witnessed hundreds of haphazard homesteads sprouting up, mainly comprising of plastic shacks or wooden cabins, while several unprotected wells were being sunk for domestic water consumption.
Although most of the settlers refused to speak to the Financial Gazette, some said they settled there in anticipation that council would regularise the areas.
“We are tired of being homeless. We came here to build our homes and we hope they (city fathers) will regularise our area as they did in Caledonia and other places,” said one young man who was reconstructing a shack that had just been damaged by the rains.
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Higher and Tertiary Education, Jonathan Moyo

PRESIDENT Robert Mugabe  has publicly reprimanded Higher and Tertiary Education, Jonathan Moyo for using the social media to air his party grievances.

While addressing at least 7 000 party members gathered in Masvingo city for the 2016 annual conference on Friday, the 92-year old leader described it as “wrong” for party leaders to take to social media platforms such as Twitter and Facebook to attempt to clear their names as well as attack fellow party members.
Mugabe said Moyo has been prolific on Twitter to criticise his opponents within the party and to try and clear his name in the case in which he is being accused by the Zimbabwe Anti-Corruption Commission of siphoning over US$400 000 from the Zimbabwe Manpowe Development fund (ZIMDEF).

“We don’t address our grievances through such platforms as Twitter and Facebook,” said President Mugabe.
“Some of us use them and the private newspapers to criticise other party leaders as well as trying to cleanse themselves, we don’t want that. These things are being done by very senior party members and not smaller ones,” he added, receiving widespread applauses from the delegates.

Moyo is thought to be a member of Generation 40 (G40), a camp which is bitterly opposed to Mnagagwa’s reported presidential bid.
Team Lacoste is reportedly rooting for Vice President Emmerson Mnangagwa to succeed President Mugabe.
Moyo has been arguing that the charges were a creation of a group of party members known as Team Lacoste with which him and others who are believed to be G40 members are embroiled in endless fights over the control of the party.
Soon after his address party members broke up into small groups to discuss thematic areas before retiring for the day. They will regroup today.

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President Mugabe and First Lady Amai Grace Mugabe arrive for the official opening of the Zanu-PF 2016 Annual People’s Conference in Masvingo last week.(Picture by Eliah Saushoma)

A GROUP of awestruck teenage boys, enjoying a schools vacation, gathered around an enormous custom-made Toyota Land Cruiser with posters of President Robert Mugabe pasted on it.
With not so many of such monstrous machines coming to this ancient city of Masvingo, the excited boys had obviously seen something to boast about to schoolmates when schools reopen in the new year.
Several other big cars belonging to Cabinet ministers, Members of Parliament and well to do individuals were rolling into the normally deserted Masvingo Agricultural Show grounds for the ruling party’s annual people’s conference, giving the lads even more spectacle to ogle at.
Such a display of power and wealth was last witnessed in the city 10 months ago when the nouveau rich, otherwise collectively known as ZANU-PF, last visited en-mass during celebrations to mark the party leader, President Mugabe’s 92nd birthday.
This time around, the who is who in ZANU-PF were here for the ruling party’s annual conference: It will not be any time soon that the colossus returns to the province, given the party’s culture of rotating the show around the country’s 10 political provinces.
Punctuated by pomp, fanfare and extravagance, last week’s Masvingo conference served as a reminder that ZANU-PF is an inflexible political powerhouse, which has no intention of relinquishing power any time soon.
Never mind the divisive factional fights that are threatening to rip the party into shreds. Fight they will, but when it comes to staking out their political claim the people making up ZANU-PF will pretend all is well to the world.
In Masvingo, the party proved that it was a master of the game of smoke and mirrors and its stranglehold on power was so palpable that any opposition would have turned green with envy.
And that has kept it in the driving seat for the past 36 years.
With the party’s political craft having been proved wanting many times since the emergence of the opposition Movement for Democratic Change party in 2000, the ruling party has largely relied on its vice-grip on State power and instruments to remain in control.
When one looks at how the Masvingo conference was staged and structured, it is evident that apart from fulfilling its constitutional requirements, ZANU-PF wanted to exhibit its clout, and that it is not looking back.
Despite their in-house squabbles, all ZANU-PF members at this conference were clearly bound by one common desire: To win the 2018 general elections at any cost.
Factionalism has always been with ZANU-PF since its founding 53 years ago and so it would be naive for anyone in the opposition family to pin their hopes on the tiffs in the ruling party to help them tilt the scales.
Ruling party leader, President Robert Mugabe, had some harsh words for the hopeful opposition in his official opening remarks last Friday afternoon.
He declared that his party had no slight intention of leaving power anytime soon.
Not even much later.

ZANU-PF youth at the conference

“The party remains strong, there is no doubt about that; in fact, very strong and formidable by any account,” he emphatically thundered.
He then mocked opposition parties that are plotting a coalition to try and upstage ZANU-PF in the 2018 general elections.
“They are sponsored to cause regime change in the country, but there has not been regime change and there won’t be any regime change.”
Indeed, to anyone following the proceedings in Masvingo, his words sounded as realistic as can possibly be, for ZANU-PF descended on the city with an unparalleled show of power and dominance.
In as much as the atmosphere was spectacular, there was a sense of fear that gripped the city as secret State security agents, uniformed police officers and soldiers patrolled the city.
Residents of the city could frequently be heard in supermarkets and eateries expressing their fear of the party, especially when huge ministerial vehicles rolled along the streets, often preceding the several motorcades of service chiefs, vice presidents and that of the President himself.
This was the might of ZANU-PF on show, a party which has the means and will to inspire fear down the spines of many.
Even Masvingo City Council might have been prejudiced of good money in vehicle parking fees because several vehicles could be seen parked on its streets without the parking discs and the city officials could not dare clamp them, in case they belonged to some “untouchable”.
All one needed, to avoid a municipal parking ticket, was a ZANU-PF sticker or poster pasted on any part of the car or an accreditation card loosely dangling inside the car.
The parking marshals could be seen looking timid and forlorn.
Another aspect which was on open display was that this party, whether by hook or crook, is a mean mobilising machine, which has the capacity to bring in the numbers it wants to paint the picture of popularity.
Arguments have been that it coerces and buses people to come to its events and threatens violence. While these appear very valid in some instances, what cannot be denied is the fact that when ZANU-PF wants numbers, it gets them.
One classic historical example was what the whole world witnessed ahead of the 2013 general elections: The party held well-attended star rallies across the country.
As a show of its commitment to remain in power, the party had over 100 buses carrying delegates from all over the country.
And, despite 4,1 million people facing starvation across the country, there was more than enough food for all the 7 000 delegates – a sure testimony that this party can, in addition to mobilising people, also amass resources for its cause, one area which its opponents heavily struggle.
To its advantage, ZANU-PF is able to use the authority of the State and the fear it inspires to mobilise both voters and resources. And the evidence was there for all to see.
Another remarkable feature at the conference which proved ZANU-PF’s supremacy was the ability to manipulate popular culture and tradition to its advantage.
There was a huge contingent of traditional chiefs whom it kept reminding that they needed to tell their subjects to be grateful to the party and its supreme leader, who has managed to source food in the times of famine and feed the entire nation.
And then there were a number of church leaders from Masvingo province, most notably the leader of the Zion Christian Church (ZCC), Bishop Nehemiah Mutendi, who was asked to give a sermon and pray for the success of the conference.
The cleric has massive following in the province. In his prayer, he thanked God for allowing ZANU-PF to rule the country and asked the Almighty to make sure that the party rules “forever and ever”.
Seated next to this reporter in the tent was a man in a navy blue suit with a ZCC badge pinned on the breast. He leapt for joy in response to the man of the cloth’s prayer as soon as he said: “Amen!”
Soon after the prayer, a clearly elated Saviour Kasukuwere, ZANU-PF’s secretary for the commissariat, asked the ZCC Mbungo stars orchestra to let out their popular Ndire ndire hit, which had the tent erupting into song and dance.
The long and short of it all is that ZANU-PF went to Masvingo — as it does in other places year after year — to show that it is an enormous political powerhouse which can hardly be moved.
Opposition parties certainly need to raise their game a thousand fold if they fancy their slightest of chances against this colossus: This was the clear and emphatic message that ZANU-PF sent out last week.
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Transport and Infrastructural Development Minister, Joram Gumbo

A SPIKE in fatal road traffic accidents this year owing to bad roads, reckless driving and poor vehicle maintenance has left safety experts troubled.
The number of road traffic fatalities for 2016 rose by 38 deaths between January and October this year as compared to the whole of last year, representing a two percent rise.
Some 1 392 people died in 36 423 road traffic accidents recorded in 2015 while 1 430 people perished in 31 876 accidents between January and October 31, 2016.
The figures for 2016 could significantly rise as the country enters the festive season, which has traditionally been the bloodiest period in the country.
The 2016 figures also do not include November, which accounted for 112 accident-related deaths while 700 people were injured.
December rains have so far accounted for six deaths recorded in two incidents of drowning whereby motorists tried to cross flooded rivers, resulting in their vehicles being swept away by raging waters.
At least 10 262 people suffered varying degrees of accident-induced injuries during the period to October 31, up from the 2015 figure of 9 685.
Ironically, the high fatality rate comes as police noted a decrease in the actual number of traffic accidents.
“This is attributed to numerous fatal crashes we had in the year where high numbers were recorded in single incidents,” said national police spokesperson, Charity Charamba, while acknowledging the increase in awareness campaigns by police and other agencies such as the Vehicle Inspection Department.
The rising road traffic deaths call for tougher measures to crack down on rampant traffic infractions, with the Traffic Safety Council of Zimbabwe (TSCZ) this week urging motorists to exercise extreme caution when on the road.
“We are experiencing road terrorism. The accident death rate is simply terrifying,” said TSCZ managing director, Obio Chinyere.
Traffic violations are rife on the country’s roads as motorists ignore red lights, hurtle down tram tracks, drive against oncoming traffic and travel at excessive speeds without paying regard to the poor state of the roads.
Chinyere lamented corruption in the traffic sector and the prevalence of fake licence holders and unlicensed drivers who “turned into lethal hazards”.
While blame has often been laid on an antiquated road system, which is now littered with potholes and razor sharp edges, Chinyere strongly believes that it all goes back to the behaviour of the driver.
In February this year, the Zimbabwe National Road Administration revealed that at least US$24 billion was required to revamp the country’s obsolete road network, which has outlived its lifespan by more than four decades.
Chinyere said: “Human error is the biggest problem. Your driving habits should be influenced by your environment. For example, you know that you are driving on a narrow road with potholes and if you speed, then that certainly is the problem. We are not saying the roads should not be maintained, but one needs to take great care in such an environment.”
TSCZ also noted that the fatal accidents were usually a result of tyre bursts and other cases of irrational traffic violations.
Some of the major accidents involving tyre bursts this year include the Kwekwe bus disaster, which occurred in March when a bus burst its front right tyre, resulting in the driver losing control.
The bus encroached onto the right lane where it collided with an oncoming minibus.
Thirty-one people died, 27 of them on the spot.
In a similar incident in April, 10 people perished when a minibus burst its rear left tyre, leading to a head-on collision with a truck.
In June, 15 people lost their lives when another minibus burst its right rear tyre, again causing a head-on collision.
Only a week later, a commuter bus burst its rear left tyre and overturned, killing nine people and injuring 17.
Ironically, all these fatal accidents happened along the newly refurbished Mutare-Plumtree highway that hardly has any potholes.
TSCZ notes that worn out tyres cause thousands of crashes and several deaths.
“As tyres age, they lose their tread and their structural integrity, increasing the likelihood of blowing out or skidding and causing a car accidents. And summertime heat makes bad tyres worse. Worn tyres create problems with control, braking and ease of handling in a number of situations, including heat, punctures, hydroplaning and leaks. At fast speeds on busy highways, loss of control due to a blowout, a puncture, or loss of traction could be catastrophic,” Chinyere said.
Around 10 percent of fatal crashes in 2016 have been attributed to the use of bad tyres.
Police corruption has also been fingered for contributing to the scourge with traffic cops often accused of taking bribes to let off careless drivers or to clear unroadworthy vehicles.
One agitated Harare motorist said in interview with the Financial Gazette this week: “Zimbabwean drivers are not scared of the police anymore and don’t respect traffic rules.”
But it is not just car drivers.
Driving instructor, Terrance Mauto, said students start out following the rules, “but become really reckless once they obtain their licences”.
During the course of the year, Transport and Infrastructure Minister, Joram Gumbo, criticised how easy it was to get a driving licence largely because of corruption and even suggested compulsory retests for private motorists.
Meanwhile, the TSCZ has initiated a number of programmes to increase road traffic awareness, including offering defensive driving courses for all drivers, instituting driving school instructors refresher courses, introducing road traffic safety clubs and bringing road safety education in schools, particularly targeting school pupils.
It has also sought partnerships with celebrities in the fields of music, acting and sport to help spread the message.

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President Robert Mugabe

IN spite of the intense pressure brought upon him to act on ambitious ZANU-PF bigwigs engrossed in the party’s nasty succession fights, President Robert Mugabe has opted for a delicate balancing act to arrest a simmering implosion within the revolutionary party as it hurtles towards make-or-break polls in 2018, the Financial Gazette can report.
Ahead of the party’s 16th annual people’s conference held in Masvingo last week, daggers had been drawn out as the two factions in the ruling party — Generation 40 (G40) and Team Lacoste — attempted to exert pressure on President Mugabe to wield the axe on their rivals.
Going into the conference, Team Lacoste’s perceived kingpin, Vice President Emmerson Mnangagwa, had rubbed G40 elements the wrong way by allegedly eyeing the top job in the event that his boss retires from active politics.
The most vicious attacks came from rubble-rousers in the party’s Women’s League, namely Sarah Mahoka and Mandiitawepi Chimene, who challenged “the crocodile” — as Mnangagwa is affectionately known — to come clean about his presidential ambitions.
As G40 functionaries gunned for Mnangagwa, those whom they perceived as providing sanctuary to “the crocodile”, became part of the collateral damage.
On top of the list were Zimbabwe National Liberation War Veterans Association leaders, Christopher Mutsvangwa (chairman), Victor Matemadanda (secretary-general) and Douglas Mahiya (spokesperson), who were expelled from ZANU-PF for conduct unbecoming of a party cadre.
Several ZANU-PF Youth League leaders were also deposed from their positions, including provincial chairmen thought to be aligned to Mnangagwa.
But Team Lacoste was not finished. The faction seized on dossiers produced by the Zimbabwe Anti-Corruption Commission of alleged impropriety by perceived G40 apparatchiks to press President Mugabe to act.
Their main targets were Saviour Kasukuwere, the party’s national political commissar, and Jonathan Moyo — seen as the mastermind behind G40’s political success.
Moyo was alleged to have misappropriated more than US$400 000 from the Zimbabwe Manpower Development Fu-nd, while Kasukuwere was accused of allocating land earmarked for youths and women to his cronies.
The war veterans had openly called on President Mugabe to get rid of Moyo and Kasukuwere.
Such was the intensity of the political ruckus that by the time the factions descended into the ancient city of Masvingo last week, each was expecting President Mugabe to read from their script.
There was an anti-climax instead.
The ZANU-PF leader stuck to his guns by refusing to give in to pressure from either side.
Mnangagwa, Moyo and Kasukuwere emerged from the conference unscathed, to fight another day.
If anything, both factions are now on a tight leash because no-one in ZANU-PF, with the exception of President Mugabe, has a secure position anymore.
In fact, in their wisdom or lack of it the factions dug their own graves by making resolutions that cemented President Mugabe’s grip on the party, while weakening their positions in a bid to ensure that none of them emerged from the conference with their tails up.
Analysts this week said ZANU-PF members who know that their real chances of succeeding President Mugabe were next to nothing appear to have made up their minds that if they cannot have it their way, then no one else should.

Vice President Emmerson Mnangagwa

Among some of the major resolutions that emerged from the conference include:
• The endorsement of President Mugabe as the party’s presidential candidate in the 2018 elections;
• That President Mugabe be declared life president;
• That all party positions be elected, except that of the president;
• The Women’s League re-submitted their resolution to have the party’s constitution amended to allow for a female vice president;
• The party should do away with the imposition of candidates in all internal elections;
• Harare International Airport be renamed Robert Gabriel Mugabe International Airport;
• All offer letters for agriculture land should not be rescinded;
• ZANU-PF’s ideology be extended to the public service; and
• That party structures and leadership be allowed to supervise various activities of government departments in their respective areas.
Analysts reasoned this week that the only person in ZANU-PF whose position is safe until the synchronised elections in 2018 was President Mugabe, who is the only one with a secured ticket to represent the party in not only the 2018 general elections, but until he dies.
In the interim, everyone else in the party would be preoccupied with personal survival as the nation heads for potentially explosive general elections.
Political analyst, Otto Saki, observed that the conference only served to fortify President Mugabe without necessarily ending the fights.
“He (President Mugabe) left the conference with a sense of consolidation, but it is in fact an entrenchment of disorder,” opined Saki.
“Do you think those supporting ED (Mnangagwa) will heed his weak calls for unity, or that those opposed to ED are not looking at power beyond him? He is going to be defied. It’s more defiance and counter plots coming”.
University of Zimbabwe political science professor, Eldred Masunungure, said the ZANU-PF leader used the conference to fortify his power by playing the factions against each other; the factions never really threatened his power in the first place.
“He (President Mugabe) has never really been in danger. The on-going ructions and radiations happening are really not about replacing him while he is still alive or displacing him, they are all about life after him. Therefore I can’t say he was weaker before the conference…He has always been strong,” said Masunungure.
Masunungure said no faction could claim bragging rights in the aftermath of the conference because none gained much.
“The temptation is to think that G40 gained some traction, but it didn’t quite do so. What you need to understand is that it went into the conference a bit degraded and it is no longer threatened with extinction as was the situation before the conference. It only managed to avert a process of total annihilation and now it’s all back to zero for both camps.
“We are likely to see the continuation of the same ructions that characterised 2016 in 2017. We will start 2017 with the pendulum dangling in the middle and we will see the swing it will take as the year progresses. The duty of this conference therefore was to balance the factions but we will continue to witness the pendulum politics,” observed Masunungure.
Before their fallout in 2015, functionaries in both G40 and Team Lacoste had worked in concert to create space within the presidium for Mnangagwa and Phelekezela Mphoko as President Mugabe’s deputies.

Vice President Phelekezela Mphoko

This was at the expense of Joice Mujuru, who had served as vice president of the party and the Republic for 10 years before her expulsion in 2014; and Simon Khaya-Moyo, who had been considered a shoo-in to succeed John Nkomo, who died in January 2013.
But after expelling Mujuru from ZANU-PF and government, and shunting Khaya-Moyo to an obscure portfolio, Team Lacoste and G40 are ruthlessly crushing each other to influence the direction the ruling party shall take in the post-Mugabe era.
Notwithstanding the pressure from either side, analysts opined this week that President Mugabe proved at the just-ended conference that he was still on top of his game despite his advancing age.
In his address to war veterans in July this year, President Mugabe indicated that he will not change the party’s leadership before the 2018 polls. Sure-enough, he has stuck to his script and went a step further by throwing both factions off balance.
Nonetheless, the factionalism was not addressed as President Mugabe simply blew hot air over the simmering divisions.
After the conference, delegates trooped back to their provinces without even knowing which of the resolutions proposed at the conference would be implemented.
Significantly, none of them can say with certainty what the future holds for them.

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Masvingo Provincial Affairs Minister, Shuvai Mahofa.

“IF you thought factionalism was imaginary, you will realise that it is very real here in Masvingo,” remarked a security officer who was vetting delegates entering the tightly fortified entrance into Masvingo show grounds, the venue for ZANU-PF’s annual conference in December, last year.
After flipping over the name tag hanging on my neck, he resignedly let me pass, probably having realised that he might have let the cat out of the bag about the unending ructions in Masvingo province to a journalist who was from the private media, for that matter.
Security was so tight at the venue of the conference that one could have easily concluded that the party was now so divided that it is now even terrified of dealing with its own officials.
The province has become the citadel of a faction called Team Lacoste, which is rooting for Vice President Emmerson Mnangagwa to succeed President Robert Mugabe in the event that he decides to retire from politics.
While Team Lacoste appears to have a numerical advantage in Masvingo, it doesn’t control key political positions in the top echelons of the provincial structures.
Calling the shots in Masvingo is a rival camp known as Generation 40 (G40), which is determined to frustrate Mnangagwa’s perceived presidential ambitions.
I had completely forgotten about the words of the security officer at the entrance to the show grounds until some very energetic singing inside the conference venue caught my attention.
Hordes of delegates from the host province had risen from their seats in one accord to sing a curious tune whose words rang: “KuMasvingo kuno kunenyaya, aheee, kunenyaya (There is an issue here in Masvingo province, surely there is an issue).”
The singing had erupted as conference delegates were being introduced to President Mugabe. I wondered if it was just a coincidence or there was a strong message that was being put across to the ZANU-PF leader.
As the conference progressed, I figured out that this was for real – indeed factionalism has taken root in Masvingo.
In jest, ZANU-PF secretary for administration, Ignatius Chombo, who was co-ordinating the conference programme, made sure he commented on the wild singing.
He indicated that the party would look into the “issue” that was being referred to in their song.
“We are here in Masvingo for three days and we will definitely have to look at the issue you are singing about,” he said to wild applause.
Despite the promises, the party’s leadership made no attempt whatsoever to inquire into what the delegates were referring to in their song perhaps because they knew exactly what the issue was.

Vice President Emmerson Mnangagwa

It was all left to President Mugabe to lambast the so-called successionists, who are fuelling divisions in the party.
But even after the harshest words from the ZANU-PF leader, there hasn’t been any respite to the factional wars.
Of the country’s 10 political provinces, Masvingo is stewing in deep-rooted factional underworld like no other.
Interestingly, no one in the party has ever had the guts to pinpoint the culprits behind the factional tussling for fear of reprisals.
Those behind the factional wars also prefer to play their politics underground, hesitant of coming out in the open to declare their factional interests.
Those who have dared to do so have previously earned a painful boot out of the party.
Former vice president Joice Mujuru is one of those who have learnt the hard way. She was dismissed from government and the party for attempting to unseat President Mugabe unconstitutionally.
Mnangagwa’s allies in the Zimbabwe National Liberation War Veterans Association (ZNLWVA) executive, among them Christopher Mutsvangwa, were also expelled from the party for denigrating President Mugabe’s leadership.
Nonetheless, names have been bandied around of people who could be at the centre of the political see-saw in the fractious Masvingo province although they all deny it.
Alleged to be linked to Team Lacoste are provincial heavyweights such as Psychomotor Minister, Josiah Hungwe — the most senior party member in Masvingo — and the Provincial Affairs Minister, Shuvai Mahofa.
Behind them are a number of Central Committee members such as parliamentary chief whip, Lovemore Matuke and deputy national secretary for legal affairs, Paul Mangwana.
All these officials deny the alleged factional leanings. The same applies to those who are said to be proponents for G40 in the province, among them Bikita South legislator, Jappy Jaboon, who is also the interim provincial political commissar; Masvingo Urban legislator, Daniel Shumba, and interim provincial chairman, Amasa Nenjana.
“I do not want to be quoted, unondipisisa zvigunwe kunehondo kuno (you will cause me trouble. There is war here),” was all Jaboon could say after being contacted for comment while relaxing at a Masvingo hotel later that Friday.
Hungwe had this to say: “Let the people who gave you all that information talk. I do not discuss party issues with the press.”
But, as the conference concluded with reading of the resolutions pregnant with subtle meanings and factional subplots, one could only conclude that kunenyaya kuMasvingo.
Party officials from Masvingo who confided in the Financial Gazette said Jaboon, Shumba and Nenjana were now operating from the national commissariat’s office in Harare after being hounded, intimidated and bullied by Team Lacoste.
“They have practically been exiled from the province and cannot operate here,” said one party official.
Other party members said recent provincial meetings have been tense with party members trading insults, accusations and ridicule.
“Things have been bad for those of us that do not think the same as the successionists. It’s too bad,” said another party member.
One provincial executive member recounted that the last provincial co-ordinating committee (PCC) meeting almost turned violent.
The meeting was held a few days before the start of the conference to discuss conference resolutions.
During the meeting, one Team Lacoste provincial executive member reportedly told the meeting that Jaboon, Nenjana and Shumba were having midnight meetings with some members who were suspended from the party for hobnobbing with Mujuru.
These included legislators, Paul Chimedza (Gutu South) and Tongai Muzenda (Gutu West).
Mahofa was said to have professed ignorance of the meetings, prompting Matuke to interject saying: “Some of us run businesses, I own a school, but if I go there, I respect the headmaster who is there; but you (pointing at Nenjana and Jaboon), treat us like your cleaners when we are in actual terms national leaders.”

President Robert Mugabe

Mangwana is said to have charged at Jaboon shouting: “We cannot have the province run from Harare. We will fight you.”
Jaboon is said to have inflamed the situation when he suggested that party cadres must unite if they are to win the upcoming Bikita West National Assembly by-election after the seat fell vacant following the incarceration of Munyaradzi Kereke for rape.
Chivi North Member of Parliament, Mathias Tongofa — also deputy minister of Youth, Indigenisation and Economic Empowerment, immediately stood up and said it was impossible for unity to prevail in the province principally because there were people who were frustrating some party projects in the province.
“Tongofa was aggrieved by the efforts of G40 members who wanted to frustrate the process of giving offer letters to people interested in certain pieces of land in Chiredzi through Mahofa’s office,” said a source.
There are skirmishes surrounding the allocation of developed land ceded by sugar making company, Tongaat Hullet in Chiredzi under the indigenisation programme, with some alleging that Team Lacoste members became the biggest beneficiaries.
In June this year, President Mugabe came face to face with the gravity of the matter when he went to Triangle to try and find solutions.
Tongofa reportedly got support from Masvingo provincial secretary for administration, Alois Baloyi, who even suggested that it should be made a conference resolution that the offer letters must not be reversed.
The meeting reached boiling point with one Robson Mavhenyengwa and a relative of Hungwe called Goddart Dunhira, who are some of the reported beneficiaries, said efforts to kick them off the land should be stopped since they sponsored many party activities from proceeds of farming.
“Dunhira said they were the sponsors of the party and their farming activities were allowing them to fund many party activities and if they were kicked out, the party would suffer financially,” said the official.
Hungwe agreed, reportedly saying: “This is a very dangerous issue. People should remain on the farms because if they are kicked out, we will not get money to finance party activities.”
To make a practical point, Dunhira, who is the provincial secretary for transport and welfare, immediately donated 30 tonnes of maize, gave 10 minibuses to carry delegates to the conference and offered to pay for all the advertising.

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Vice President Emmerson Mnangagwa

…George Chiweshe tippped for chief Justice

PRESIDENT Robert Mugabe has given Vice President Emmerson Mnangagwa the green light to expedite controversial amendments to the supreme law of the land to facilitate the direct appointment of the next Chief Justice, setting the stage for bruising court battles with civil rights defenders who are against the impending constitutional changes.
Highly-placed sources told the Financial Gazette this week that the ZANU-PF leader who has avoided commenting on the contentious appointment of the country’s top judge ever since the furore over Chief Justice Godfrey Chidyausiku successor broke out, wants Mnangagwa, who also happens to be the Justice Minister, to see through the process of amending the Constitution to give him latitude to handpick the next Chief Justice.
Last month, Cabinet brawled along factional lines at one of its meetings over the controversial amendment with Mnangagwa’s backers throwing their full weight behind the changes while a rival faction, known as Generation 40 (G40), wanted the process to be done in terms of the existing constitutional provisions.
It was on the sidelines of a stormy Cabinet meeting last month that President Mugabe implored the Vice President to hasten the process to enable him to appoint a Chief Justice with the proper orientation and attitude towards the revolutionary party.
There is therefore increasing pressure to disregard the interview process initiated by the Judicial Services Commission (JSC) last year in terms of the current Constitutional provisions for the selection and appointment of the Chief Justice.
“The (Cabinet) meeting had well ended and as ministers lined up to shake hands with him, the President — who had remained silent while emotions ran high in the meeting — got to VP Mnangagwa and said ‘carry on with the process’,” said a Cabinet source who declined to be named.
Information, Media and Broadcasting Services Minister Christopher Mushohwe declined to comment on the matter saying issues discussed in Cabinet were confidential.
“You cannot ask me that. You know very well that Cabinet matters are not discussed with the media. Let the person who told you that furnish you with all the information you need,” 
“You want me to violate the rules, no. I will not tell you anything that transpires in Cabinet. I uphold the confidentiality of Cabinet matters,” he added.
Chidyausiku retires after having served for 16 years while his predecessor, Anthony Gubbay, served for 11 years before he was forced to resign in 1992 after falling out with the ruling party over the chaotic land reform programme.
It would appear George Chiweshe, currently serving as president of the High Court, is preferred to take over from Chidyausiku, who is due to retire next month after reaching the mandatory retirement age of 70 years.
Chiweshe boycotted an interview process for the selection of the Chief Justice, only to later indicate that he was complying with a High Court judgment by Charles Hungwe suspending the interview process. He had been shortlisted along with Deputy Chief Justice, Luke Malaba and Supreme Court and Constitutional Court judges Rita Makarau and Paddington Garwe.
Both Makarau and Garwe served as presidents of the High Court before their elevation.
Makarau is currently on secondment at the Zimbabwe Electoral Commission (ZEC), and is the secretary of the JSC.
Hungwe’s judgment followed an urgent High Court application by a University of Zimbabwe law student for a provisional court order stopping the interviews, pending the determination of another application to suspend them until section 180 of the Constitution could be amended.
The applicant challenged the procedure for appointing the Chief Justice, which involved the JSC. It was argued that the procedure was improper because it involved judges who sat on the JSC having a say in appointing the head of the Judiciary.

High Court president George Chiweshe

The applicant said the President should appoint the Chief Justice directly after just consulting with the JSC.
During the hearing of the case, the permanent secretary in the Ministry of Justice, Legal and Parliamentary Affairs, Virginia Mabhiza, produced an affidavit stating that Mnangagwa had submitted documents to Cabinet seeking approval for the amendment of section 180 of the Constitution to change the method of appointing the Chief Justice along the lines proposed by the applicant.
Hungwe then ruled that the interviews should not proceed.
The interviews went ahead after the JSC, headed by Chidyausiku, said it had noted an appeal against Hungwe’s judgment, effectively suspending his order.
Malaba, who became the first Deputy Chief Justice of the Supreme Court after constitutional amendments in 2008, emerged the best candidate in the interviews with a reported score of 91 percent.
Makarau was second with 90 percent, with Garwe coming third after scoring 52 percent.
Under section 180 of the Constitution, the Chief Justice is appointed by the President from a list of three nominees selected by the JSC following advertisements and public interviews.
Sources indicated that there was growing support within a faction of ZANU-PF for President Mugabe to appoint Chiweshe, who had rescued the incumbent from defeat by Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) leader Morgan Tsvangirai in 2008 elections.
Chiweshe, a retired brigadier general, is a war veteran and former military judge who had been seconded to ZEC at the time. He withheld election results for six weeks after President Mugabe had lost the elections to Tsvangirai who, however, failed to garner enough votes to be declared the winner, forcing the presidential election into a runoff.
Tsvangirai had to pull out of the runoff election after several of his supporters were reportedly killed, resulting in President Mugabe winning the poll.
But the political crisis that ensued forced his party to form a coalition government with Tsvangirai and another MDC outfit, then led by Arthur Mutambara. The coalition government collapsed in 2013 following ZANU-PF’s landslide victory.
Chiweshe has the backing of a faction called Team Lacoste, which has rallied behind Mnangagwa to succeed President Mugabe in the event that he leaves office. A rival faction, G40, wants the selection of the Chief Justice to be based on the interview process.
Sources indicated that Malaba, who is 66 years old, has only four years before reaching retirement age, a situation his critics have seized on to argue that his appointment would be untenable.
Malaba is said to have the support of G40, which has lambasted a parallel process.
They argue that Chiweshe, who is 64 years old this year, has six years to serve as Chief Justice.
Makarau, at 56, is the youngest of the candidates.
The G40 faction is said to prefer Makarau in the event that Malaba is not appointed, arguing that this would still be in line with the provisions of the current Constitution.
Makarau would have 14 years before reaching retirement age as a Chief Justice.
Mnangagwa’s backers are banking on planned constitutional amendments to allow President Mugabe to appoint Chiweshe as the new Chief Justice.
The amendment would give the President power to appoint a candidate of his choice.
Analysts said the proposed amendment of the Constitution to allow the President to directly appoint a Chief Justice of his choice had affected confidence in the process.
“The whole process of appointing the Chief Justice is now politicised and lacking public confidence. Whoever is chosen shall bear the burden of proving their independence in an era where all the State arms are heavily politicised,” said political analyst, Rashweat Mukundu.
Constitutional law expert, Love-more Madhuku, said there was a strong possibility that President Mugabe might not even appoint any of the three judges approved by the JSC because of the provision of subsection three of section 80 of the Constitution which says the President can turn down all the names given to him if he is not satisfied with them.

President Robert Mugabe

It also emerged this week that the ruling ZANU-PF party was preparing for further Constitutional amendments that would remove term limits for the President.
Under the current Constitution adopted in 2013, the country’s President can only serve two terms of five years each.
In terms of the Constitution, President Mugabe will serve his last term if he is re-elected in 2018 elections.
At the party’s annual conference in Masvingo in December, ZANU-PF did not hide its intentions to tinker with the charter after delegates unanimously resolved that President Mugabe must rule until death.
Such an amendment would certainly court the ire of civil society and opposition political parties, who would be persuaded to approach the courts for relief.
Sources within ZANU-PF also indicated that the party was worried by prospects of an impeachment in terms of section 97 of the Constitution.
They said the party took this “very seriously”.
“That clause of the Constitution will have to be examined,” said one of the sources.
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Chief Justice Godfrey Chidyausiku

PERHAPS, not many statements have undermined the country’s standing on the global stage in terms of the rule of law as much as the ZANU-PF government’s comments in 2002 that it would defy court judgments that it does not like.
These sentiments were made in July 2002 after the then justice, legal and parliamentary affairs minister, Patrick Chinamasa, had been found guilty on two counts of contempt of court relating to his criticism of a court verdict and failure to file legal papers in respect of an arrest warrant issued against him by former High Court judge, Justice Fergus Blackie.
This marked the height of a protracted dispute between government and the judiciary, which intensified after the courts condemned the invasion of white-owned farms by ZANU-PF supporters led by frustrated veterans of the 1970s war of liberation.
“We will respect judges where the judgments are true judgments,” said ZANU-PF leader, President Robert Mugabe, back then, describing Blackie as “a judge who sits alone in his house, and says: ‘This one is guilty of contempt’, that judgment should never be obeyed”.
Jonathan Moyo, the then minister of information, followed that up with blunt criticism of the judge.
“There is no doubt that fair-minded and law abiding citizens will see this judgment for what it is: Outrageous, sinister, highly personalised crusade made by someone who should be packing his bags,” he said.
Soon after, Blackie was arrested on corruption allegations and then subsequently lost his job.
The then Chief Justice, Anthony Gubbay, was also forced into early retirement and some judges left the bench.
Gubbay was replaced by Godfrey Chidyausiku, whose imminent retirement has, once again, brought to the fore the ill-omened question of whether or not the judicial system in Zimbabwe is truly independent from political interference.
Ever since those incidents, the question of judicial independence in the country and respect for the Constitution by powerful ZANU-PF individuals, the ruling party itself and government at large, has persisted.
Things have not been helped either by the interference of ZANU-PF in legal issues involving opposition political parties, particularly the Movement for Democratic Change (MDC-T) led by Morgan Tsvangirai, which accuses the courts of perpetually and deliberately passing judgments skewed in favour of the ruling party.
A case in point was the MDC-T’s court challenge in which the opposition party disputed the results of the 2002 presidential election, which it argued was rigged in favour of ZANU-PF.
The challenge was in terms of section 89 of the Constitution, which provides that “any aggrieved candidate may challenge the validity of an election of a president or vice president by lodging a petition or application with the Constitutional Court”.
Some 15 years later, the case is yet to be concluded.
In between, there have been two equally hotly contested general elections.
Presently, there is a huge debate in the legal fraternity and academia over Chidyausiku’s succession amid reports that rival ZANU-PF camps are fighting hard to influence the process and have a say on who becomes the next Chief Justice.
This fervent interest, says analysts, exposes the mere fact that ZANU-PF has no respect for and will always seek to undermine the judiciary and trample on the Constitution willy nilly.
The process of replacing Chidyausiku has surprisingly become a battleground for ZANU-PF factional fights as reports suggest that the Team Lacoste faction, which is campaigning to have Vice President Emmerson Mnangagwa succeed President Mugabe prefers a particular candidate and procedure of selecting the candidate from that of its rival, Generation 40, or G40 faction.

Vice President Emmerson Mnangagwa

The camps are brawling over a controversial amendment to section 80 of the Constitution, which seeks to allow the President to handpick a Chief Justice as opposed to the current provision whereby the President only appoints after candidates go through public interviews presided over by the Judicial Service Commission (JSC).
Mnangagwa’s backers have thrown their full weight behind the amendment, while the rival G40 faction wants the process to be done in terms of the existing constitutional provision.
Legal and constitutional experts are wary of the intentions of political meddling in the judiciary, which they say casts a dark cloud on efforts to preserve constitutionalism and the rule of law.
Government’s apparent appetite to amend the Constitution for selfish and political reasons has also been strongly questioned.
By the time the new Constitution was brought about in June 2013, the compromise Lancaster House Constitution of 1979 had been amended more than 20 times, mainly for political expediency.
Most notable is the 2000 change which paved the way for government to seize white-owned farms.
Whenever the ZANU-PF government comes face to face with a stumbling constitutional provision, it is the national charter that suffers, notwithstanding that the second section of the Constitution declares that: “This Constitution is the supreme law of Zimbabwe and any law, practice, custom or conduct inconsistent with it is invalid to the extent of its inconsistency?”
How then does government, whenever it finds out that its preferred conduct is inconsistent with the Constitution, instead of conforming, it alters the very charter to validate that conduct?
What is also frustrating to many is the fact that government is normally unmoved on issues of economic nature, but quickly jolts into action when aspects that threaten the party’s hold on power emerge.
It boggles the mind that the same government which has been so painstakingly slow to align several laws with the 2013 Constitution suddenly finds itself in a great hurry to effect the amendment.
Such a situation is placing the judiciary under unnecessary pressure, while the machinations involved threaten its independence.
“The traditional defence of judicial independence rests on a judgment that the court’s distinctiveness and institutional weakness is important to defend because of the special functions it provides for our legal and political order. If judges work too closely with elected officials, they risk succumbing to their influence,” said a top Harare lawyer who declined to be identified for professional reasons.
University of Zimbabwe constitutional law lecturer, Greg Linnington, echoed the sentiments.
In reference to the proposed amendment of section 180 he said: “This is bad news for the independence of the judiciary. Much power is being given to the Executive, which is precisely what this Constitution set to correct by limiting Executive powers. The problem with political interference is that judges are more likely to be more sympathetic to the Executive and I think that is a great concern.”
Another constitutional law expert, Lovemore Madhuku, said: “There has been political interference from the beginning. If you look at subsection two of 180, you realise that the JSC invites the President along with the public to nominate potential candidates for the post of Chief Justice and then he has power to even reject all of them and order the process to be redone altogether until his preferred candidate emerges. Remember he also nominates. In the amendment, he is being given power to even appoint someone, who would have not undergone the public interview process altogether.”
Madhuku, who, some years back, transformed a labour movement lobby group, the National Constitutional Assembly (NCA) into a political party, added: “The amendment is just laying open what is being said by the Constitution and that has been the Zimbabwean disease. It’s like two congregants who belong to a church which does not permit beer drinking, but they both drink. One drinks openly, while the other tries to hide it, but the bottom line is that they both drink. So in this case, Team Lacoste is like the open drinker who is saying to his fellow congregant (G40): ‘Let’s just drink openly, there is no need to hide.’ They are simply removing the thin veil off section 180. That is why we have always said this Constitution is nonsensical.”
Madhuku’s NCA outfit encouraged a NO vote in the 2013 Constitutional referendum, but lost.
Legal and parliamentary watchdog, Veritas, also said the amendment was influenced by political considerations rather than a desire to uphold the law.
“The system laid down by the Constitution gives far more balance between the three arms of the State,” mourned Veritas on its website.
The Law Society of Zimbabwe (LSZ) which is a critical component of the judiciary as it represents and regulates legal practitioners in the country, has also expressed disappointment over the issue.
LSZ president, Vimbai Nyemba said: “The LSZ is generally dismayed by the attitude of government towards the Constitution. The swiftness to introduce a constitutional amendment Bill this early in the lifespan of the Constitution is cause for concern. The spectre of amendments should not revisit the nation so soon after it overwhelmingly voted for a new Constitution, which consigned the patched up Lancaster House Constitution to the dustbins of history.”
As the debate rages on, it is increasing becoming evident that judicial independence might just be a myth.
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Zimbabwe loses at least 50 million trees annually to rampant felling

…as councils plunder funding

AN old man sporting a fringe of whitish-grey hair around his balding and mottled scalp, suddenly appeared from the dense woodland.
His back was hunched underneath the burden of an enormous load of freshly extracted tree bark.
As he slowly approached, his demureness told a tale of someone who has endured grinding poverty.
His once deep blue jacket, now faded to a light grey, covered a torn and sweat-stained blue golf shirt.
He wore an old pair of khaki denims, timeworn at the knees to testify that they had seen better days.
On his feet he wore some very old synthetic sandals that left almost a quarter of his cracked feet unprotected.
His eyes, filled with loneliness and despair told a story of someone who no longer saw much purpose of life.
His nose was set above a crooked mouth, with little lines at the corners, giving his face the character of someone who used to smile often. But the firm set of his square jaws revealed a portrait of a man who has been failed by circumstances.
He had the resigned look of someone who knows that at his age life was no longer giving, but only taking away; and so he only needed to do just enough to get him along till time calls.
The 77-year-old Misheck Munsaka from Donga village under chief Sikalenge is one of the many villagers in Matabeleland North’s Binga district who rely on stripping trees of their bark to manufacture makeshift fishing nets for sale to fishermen and women that illegally ply the upper shores of Lake Kariba.
The old man’s livelihood is, however, having devastating effects on the forests because the young trees being targeted for their bark are dying before reaching maturity. As a result of this and many other rampant practices, such as cutting down trees for firewood and household furniture, as well as clearing land for agriculture, the country’s last pristine forests are in grave danger.
This is despite the existence of what is supposed to be a noble programme to conserve these unique forests that skirt the Zambezi valley’s biodiversity corridor.
After realising that severe deforestation and land degradation globally was significantly contributing to carbon emissions, United Nations member States set out, in 2008, to address the problem through what became known as the carbon offset approach, mediated by carbon markets and facilitated by international accords and global climate finance.
The programme involves carrying out random tree censuses in each forest and translating them into carbon credits for sale.
In such schemes, carbon emissions in one part of the world (usually the industrialised north) are offset by initiatives that reduce emissions in another part of the world where there are plenty of forests and opportunities for new carbon trapping (carbon sinks); Africa being one of the major focus areas.
Carbon sinks are elements of the earth such as forests and wetlands that help cleanse the air of the deadly pollutant prevailing, carbon dioxide, which accounts for much of the global warming.
The projects mainly focus on poverty reduction and biodiversity protection, creating a win-win scenario whereby people who reside in sylvan areas are incentivised to conserve forests.
The UN established the Reduced Emissions from Deforestation and Degradation (REDD) programme as part of the collective global response to climate change by cutting production of gases that accelerate climate change.
After joining the programme in 2013, Zimbabwe identified the Zambezi escarpment and the Eastern Highlands greenbelts as prime targets for its implementation.
The carbon-based compensation for projects that would ideally result in reduced carbon emissions by preserving forests that act as key carbon sinks, became known as the REDD+ project.
Zimbabwe loses at least 50 million trees annually to rampant felling, particularly in areas where a massive army of hundreds of thousands of people were resettled in forested areas in the past decade and started cutting trees, mainly for curing tobacco.
Tobacco curing alone is estimated to be decimating about 7,5 million trees annually.
It has since emerged that attempts to sustainably manage forests, conserve and enhance forest carbon stocks in Zimbabwe is dismally failing to bear fruit as stakeholders warn that the politics of access and control over forests and the funds generated through the sale of carbon credits is challenging the conventional understanding that formed the basis for the project.
Primarily, Carbon Green Africa, the local REDD+ implementing partner, identified four rural district councils, namely Binga, Nyaminyami, Nyanga and Hurungwe as managers of the carbon credits fund.

The local authorities, that control land in Zimbabwe’s rural areas – the only places where meaningful forests still remain – would incentivise people in their areas to preserve the forests through instituting alternative ways of living that do not disturb the forests.
Such projects included beekeeping, bringing in alternative source of energy and capacitating farmers to be able to work on already available farmland through supply of soil-enriching inputs rather than have them clear virgin forests to access fertile soils.
Despite many communities having expressed great interest in the projects, very little, if anything, has been done to date.
As such, communities are losing heart and are headed back to decimating the forests.
Munsaka is one of those who had given up his trade of harvesting tender tree bark in the hope that the project would assist him in other ways.
Now frustrated and gnawed by poverty, he, like many others, has reverted to his old trade.
The Financial Gazette caught up with him recently as he made his way out of a nearby forest.
As he leaned against a contorted tree to afford us a little chat, same sticky sap from the enormous tree dripped on the old man’s clothes.
“When this programme was introduced to us, everyone was enthusiastic and hopeful, but everything is upside down now. We have no choice, but to return back to our old way of life,” he said through a volunteer translator.
He heaved a tired sigh and continued: “We have not seen any money being given out ever since the programme began two years ago. We have been very patient for no benefit.”
He did not ask for assistance as he suddenly lifted up his load and trudged off down the road without saying anything further.
The failure of the REDD+ project has partly been blamed on corruption in local authorities and general lack of understanding of the project along the entire chain.
For example, Binga Rural District Council (RDC) last year allegedly failed to account for US$109 000 of the REDD+ money raised from the sale of carbon credits.
The situation has brewed tension as councillors accuse management of misappropriating the money.
“After realising that nothing was going on in terms of the agreed projects, we made an inquiry and discovered that council had been given US$109 000 earmarked for it, but now only US$3 400 remains in the account. The rest cannot be accounted for. So we have resolved that the books be audited so that we see what happened,” said Elmon Mudenda, chairman of the Binga RDC’s environmental committee.
Binga chief executive officer, Joshua Muzamba declined to comment, saying: “I cannot respond to those allegations since I am an employee of council. I will leave it to my employer.”
Carbon Green Africa had also allied with the Hurungwe RDC and local farmers there for the same REDD+ initiative to offer a range of benefits that included carbon dividends and alternative livelihood projects in exchange for protecting forests, and planting trees.
But other powerful forces, with other ideas about resource use and economic priorities, have derailed the project. Politically-connected tobacco farmers, who migrated to the area during the 2000 land reform programme, have decided to instead harvest the forest timber to cure their tobacco.
“Carbon forestry projects, just like previous interventions in forest use, ownership and management, have not been the panacea we had expected because multiple conflicts have emerged between landowners, forest users and project developers,” said Washington Zhakata, manager of climate change in the Ministry of Environment, Water and Climate.
Zhakata also said there was a possibility that RDCs could be ripped off by investors.
“RDCs can enter into agreements with private players ill-informed of the deals involved and this leaves them vulnerable to investors, who can easily take advantage of their ignorance, making false promises, while reaping millions and paying very little back the RDCs,” he said.
Environment Africa regional director, Barney Mawire, highlighted yet another complication to the whole issue by indicating that Zimbabwe was finding it difficult to market its dry carbon credits, which means they could be suffering low investor uptake.
“You have to understand that these are voluntary markets which are volatile. We understand that most investors are inclined towards the tropical rainforests in places like the Democratic Republic of Congo which are better stocked,” he said.
Carbon Green Africa chief executive officer, Charles Ndondo, confirmed that they were struggling to find the market for the over three million carbon credits at their disposal.
“We remain hopeful that some of the prospective buyers we have engaged will come through,” he said.
The situation has also not been helped by ructions among stakeholders which have seen the Forestry Commission being completely frozen out, while Environment Africa was forced out soon after it completed the baseline survey on which REDD+ was modelled.
“We pulled out of the programme a long time ago,” said Mawire, refusing to state the reasons for pulling out and referring the Financial Gazette to Ndondo, who was not interested in discussing the issue either.
Forestry Commission spokesperson, Violet Makoto simply said: “We have not spearheaded any REDD+ project.”
As the war of access and control of forests rages on, making climate change mitigation through forestry harder to attain, experts say there is need for more pragmatic approaches if the country is to succeed in its efforts to avoid having its remaining lush forests turn- ed into deserts.
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Saviour Kasukuwere

A FACTION linked to Vice President Emmerson Mnangagwa is pushing for the revival of the National Elections Directorate to neutralise Saviour Kasukuwere who, as the national political commissar, has been co-ordinating ZANU-PF’s internal polls, the Financial Gazette can report.
The ruling party discarded the National Elections Directorate in 2014 in order to destroy a cabal associated with former vice president, Joice Mujuru, who was accused of hijacking the organ to further her factional agendas.
Mujuru was dismissed from ZANU-PF at the party’s last congress in December 2014 on allegations of attempting to remove President Robert Mugabe from power using unconstitutional means.
She denies the accusations that saw more than 200 of her allies either being suspended or expelled from the governing party.
Having discarded the National Elections Directorate, its functions were not explicitly devolved to any of the party’s organs.
To fill in the void created by the oversight, Kasukuwere is facilitating the conduct of the party’s internal elections in his capacity as national political commissar.
But a faction aligned to Mnangagwa, known as Team Lacoste, now wants the directorate to be revived to dilute the 47-year-old politician’s influence.
Team Lacoste accuses “Tyson” — as Kasukuwere is affectionately known — of going beyond his mandate and not being a neutral convener of the party’s internal polls, having lost crucial members in key party organs through votes of no confidence, suspensions and dismissals.
As secretary for the commissariat, Kasukuwere’s responsibilities encompass the coordination of party programmes at provincial, district and party levels; formulation of strategies and their implementation.
He has had absolute control of processes to choose parliamentary candidates, provincial chairs as well as any other electable position in the party.
Since taking up the position in 2014, the legislator for Mount Darwin South has been a thorn in Team Lacoste’s flesh.
His adversaries accuse him of promoting the interests of a rival faction that goes by the moniker Generation 40 or G40 although he denies it.
G40 is fighting tooth and nail to derail Mnangagwa’s perceived presidential ambitions and has been linked to the dismissal from the party of Vice President’s allies, among them, Christopher Mutsvangwa, Douglas Mahiya, Victor Matemadanda, Godfrey Tsenengamu and Vengai Musengi.
Team Lacoste is, therefore, aggressively lobbying to have the National Elections Directorate resuscitated and placed under President Mugabe’s two deputies, Mnangagwa and Phelekezela Mphoko, in the absence of the national chairman who used to preside over it.
At the party’s congress in 2014, President Mugabe demoted Simon Khaya-Moyo from the position of national chairman to party spokesman, but opted to leave the slot vacant. He then directed Mnangagwa and Mphoko to assume the functions of the national chairman on a rotational basis.

Vice President Emmerson Mnangagwa

Team Lacoste is hopeful that once under the purview of the Vice Presidents, Mnangagwa would be able to overshadow Mphoko since he is more experienced, politically, having served in government and the party longer than his compatriot, although it is hardly conceivable that the former diplomat would be an easy pushover. Mnangagwa also enjoys a long association with President Mugabe, dating back 53 years ago.
“You have to understand that the elections directorate vets possible candidates for internal polls such as primary elections to choose legislators and councillors as well as the party provincial leaderships. The current setting where Tyson has been doing it is not healthy for us. You see how he has been defending the co-options he has made in provincial structures yet, it is supposed to be the election directorate’s duty to co-opt people into vacant leadership positions. So the general consensus (among Mnangagwa’s supporters) is that this situation has to change going into 2018,” said a ZANU-PF source aligned to Team Lacoste.
It now remains to be seen if Team Lacoste would succeed in pushing to have the directorate placed under the purview of the Vice Presidents, who are performing the functions of the national chairman.
It is unlikely though that they will push for its incorporation in the party’s constitution because that would take longer unless they circumvent some of the processes. Besides, they also do not seem to have the critical mass to do it in the wake of the expulsions and suspensions of their key allies.
In terms of the party’s constitution, the power to amend the charter lies with the Central Committee, subject to ratification by congress, convened after every five years.
Once put before the Central Committee, the proposal to amend the charter must pass with a two thirds majority; the same threshold is required for it to sail through congress.
The last congress was held in 2014, with the next scheduled for 2019.
ZANU-PF insiders said the only viable way to bring back the directorate would be to convince President Mugabe to make a declaration to that effect.
It would, nonetheless, appear that G40 could still have the numbers to even things out given the composition of the directorate, which used to comprise of the national chairman (as chair), the secretary for administration, the national political commissar, the secretary for legal affairs, leaders of the women and youth leagues and three committee members drawn from the Politburo.
To their advantage, Team Lacoste claim to be in control of the legal department, with Mnangagwa providing them with the cover.
ZANU-PF’s deputy-secretary for legal affairs, Paul Mangwana, believed to be Mnangagwa’s ally, this week said the party’s Vice Presidents should supervise internal elections interchangeably unlike the current situation whereby the commissariat department is running the show on its own, with President Mugabe’s deputies only being invited to drum up support for ruling party candidates during parliamentary by-elections.
“The political commissar is only a member of the directorate responsible for organising party systems,” he said.
Lately, Kasukuwere has been on the ropes for allowing nine provinces to be run by chairpersons who did not go through internal elections.
The previous office holders where shown the exits either for supporting Mujuru, pursuing factional agendas or insubordination.
Those who replaced them, according to Team Lacoste, were handpicked by Kasukuwere, who has since argued that the nine provincial chairmen were co-opted in line with ZANU-PF’s constitution.
The faction is therefore ratcheting up pressure on him to allow elections in the affected provinces in the hope that their proxies would prevail if the polls were to be conducted by an Elections Directorate.
In the case of the provincial chairmen, Mangwana said a Provincial Elections Directorate must preside over the matter at provincial level, reporting to the National Elections Directorate as has always been the case.
“So nothing has really changed except that now Vice Presidents chair the national elections directorate in the place of a national chairman. The chairmanship was abolished as you might know,” said Mangwana.
Contacted for comment this week, Kasukuwere said it was immaterial to debate about the elections directorate because, as the party’s national political commissar, he will still be involved in the running of internal polls in one way or the other.
“I do not care about whether or not there is the elections directorate. As political commissar, either way, I will still be involved in the running of elections in the party,” he said.
Analysts said Team Lacoste would find the proposal a hard sell because the national political commissar has been doing a good job by delivering victories in by-elections, with the exception of Norton constituency, where an independent candidate, Temba Mliswa, pulled a shocker.
They said his work rate would always present challenges for other members of the directorate to match because Kasukuwere stops at nothing to achieve his mission.

ZANU-PF’s deputy-secretary for legal affairs, Paul Mangwana

The fact that a larger section of the party comprising young Turks and women is in support of the existing state of affairs, is also seen presenting headaches for Team Lacoste, which has lost control of key organs of the party.
There are also reports that a section of ZANU-PF would want Ignatius Chombo, who could not be contacted for comment this week, to run the directorate, as secretary for administration. What that means is that it would be difficult for the party to achieve consensus on the matter, which favours the status quo.
Political scientist, Eldred Masunungure, said the resolution of the matter would largely depend on how President Mugabe would seek to balance the factional interests in ZANU-PF.
The University of Zimbabwe lecturer reasoned that President Mugabe might first monitor the nature of the fights before acting.
“It (the directorate) has a 50-50 percent chance of seeing the light of day, but it will largely depend on how he intends to balance the weights. If at a particular time the weight is tilted against Team Lacoste, he would want to balance that by bringing the directorate to life. So in this case, it will depend on the amount of power that Team Lacoste or G40 have,” said Masunungure.
“It has been the tradition of the party since independence to put up the directorate to run internal elections. The duty has never been a monopoly of individuals, but a collective effort. But I see a situation whereby G40 would ferociously resist the directorate because it is so far in charge. Running primary elections is a key determinant in the future of the party,” he added.
Zimbabwe Democracy Institute director, Pedzisai Ruhanya, said it was highly unlikely for President Mugabe to change the current order.
“He is very much unlikely to upset the status quo,” he opined, adding that ZANU-PF bigwigs were now doing things in his name, taking advantage of his advanced age.
“There are many things that are being done in his name. People are doing things that meet (President) Mugabe’s general expectations and are only concerned with not doing things that upset him. So in this case, it will boil down to who (President) Mugabe has ears for,” said Ruhanya.
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Zimbabwe People First leader Joice Mujuru

OPPOSITION Zimbabwe People First (ZPF) led by former vice president, Joice Mujuru, will hold its inaugural elective convention in September, setting the stage for a bruising battle for senior positions among its cadres.
The congress — to take place in Harare — will see some of those who have cast their eyes on leadership positions squaring up for the first time since the formation of the party in 2015.
Currently, all positions, including that of party president, are occupied by interim office bearers.
The party is largely comprised of former ZANU-PF cadres who were expelled along with Mujuru in December 2014 after being accused of attempting to topple President Robert Mugabe.
ZPF had initially set the convention date for September last year, but it was postponed amid reports of squabbling within its ranks.
The party is also under pressure to finalise proper party structures in time for the start of formal negotiations for a coaltion with other opposition political parties in preparation for next year’s general elections.
ZPF spokesperson, Jealousy Mawarire, confirmed that the party is now fully engaged in preparations for the September convention.
“I can confirm that convention preparations are now in full swing. We do not have a specific venue for now. That is what relevant authorities are working on and once we are done, we will obviously inform the nation,” he said.
Mawarire said the party was carrying out an audit of its structures to determine who would form the expected 8 000 delegates.
“We are finalising the audit of the structures and once we are content with that, we will move to the next stage, which is mobilising resources for the convention and preparing the venue and programmes,” he said, adding: “We will be picking at least four members from each ward. The ward leadership will be asked to submit the names of at least four people, one each, from the youth wing, women’s wing, main wing and the war veterans’ wing. So as we speak, the lower structures are preparing for elections to choose people into district and provincial structures. These would make nominations for those they would want to be part of the national executive council as specified by our constitution.”
According to the ZPF draft constitution, which would be adopted at the convention, the National Executive Council (NEC) would be made up of 110 members.
The NEC is ZPF’s second most powerful organ after the National Standing Committee (NSC), consisting of 18 members.
Indications so far are that party members are involved in serious canvassing for leadership positions, particularly those in the NSC, as the clock ticks away.
Among the ZPF bigwigs said to be interested in NSC positions are former ministers Sylvester Nguni, Kudakwashe Bhasikiti and Dzikamai Mavhaire.
Home Affairs Minister, Ignatius Chombo’s ex-wife, Marian, is reportedly seeking to lead the women’s wing.
With Mujuru’s position appearing to be safe at the moment barring late entries, the battle is on the vice presidency where Bhasikiti is likely to fight it out with former MDC-T senior official, Samuel Sipepa Nkomo.
Sources said former diplomat, John Mvundura, is also campaigning for the vice presidency.
Mavhaire is reportedly eyeing the national chairman’s post.
Former army brigadier general, Aggripa Mutambara is reportedly eyeing the position of national co-ordinator and is likely to be challenged by former ZANU-PF Central Committee member, Munyaradzi Banda.
The position is an equivalent of the national political commissar in ZANU-PF or the organising secretary in the MDC-T, something which underlines how crucial it is since it involves running the party’s structures.
Former ZANU-PF Member of Parliament, David Butau is linked to the national treasurer’s position.
Mawarire appeared to confirm the jockeying that is going on in the party.
“For now, I can say at least the top five positions that will be directly elected at congress will be the vice president, national chairman, secretary general, national co-ordinator and the treasurer general,” he said.
Contacted for comment this week, Bhasikiti said: “I have been reported to be interested in the vice presidency, but I am more interested in building the party structures than occupying a position. I cannot of course rule out that people could be tussling for various positions, which is very normal in a political party.”
Mavhaire declined to comment while Butau, Nguni, Mvundura and Chombo’s former wife were not picking calls on their mobile phones.
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Higher and Tertiary Education Minister, Jonathan Moyo

SHOCKING details of a plot to nail Higher and Tertiary Education Minister Jonathan Moyo over the alleged abuse of funds from the Zimbabwe Manpower Development Fund (ZIMDEF) emerged this week as the dog-eat-dog factional fights in the ruling party spilled to its youth wing, the Financial Gazette can exclusively report.
The ZANU-PF Politburo member was arrested by the Zimbabwe Anti-Corruption Commission (ZACC) in November last year for alleged abuse of office and misappropriation of more than US$400 000 of ZIMDEF funds.
Moyo, along with his deputy, Godfrey Gandawa, are facing several allegations, among them, abusing ZIMDEF money to acquire bicycles for traditional leaders in Tsholotsho North, a constituency under Moyo, and influencing the Fund to release 100 000 litres of fuel worth US$118 500, which was said to have been diverted to the black market.
Both ministry officials denied the charges, arguing that they never used the money for personal gain, but for charity and to fund ZANU-PF activities.
Moyo confirmed last year to have donated, through ZAIMDEF, 100 000 litres of fuel coupons towards the one-million-man march, staged by the party’s Youth League in May, in solidarity with President Robert Mugabe, who was facing protests at the time from former liberation war fighters, disenchanted with his rule.
Following his arrest last year the Higher Education Minister could not be arraigned before the magistrates court after he successfully approached the Constitutional Court (ConCourt) seeking relief on the basis that ZACC had no powers to arrest and detain him.
In its ruling the ConCourt suspended his arrest until a determination of his application challenging the consttutionality of the arrest. The court is still to make a ruling on the application
The Financial Gazette can reveal that the ZANU-PF Youth League is currently divided right through the middle over ZACC’s investigations.
A faction campaigning for Vice President Emmerson Mnangagwa to succeed President Mugabe now stands accused of sinking to desperate depths to nail Moyo who, lately, has not been hiding his disapproval of Mnangagwa ascending to the top office in the event that the current holder retires.
In an unsigned letter to the ruling party’s secretary for administration, Ignatius Chombo, members of the ZANU-PF Youth League, who signed off as “worried youths”, alleged that the party’s head of the secretariat, Dickson Dzora, was putting pressure to bear on them to “mislead” ZACC investigators into believing that the fuel coupons never reached their office at the party’s headquarters in Harare.
They specifically alleged that Dzora had been attempting to push his agenda through Blessing Mupaya, the league’s national director.
Dzora, who denied the accusations this week, is also being accused of promoting factionalism by coercing party youths to align themselves with the Team Lacoste faction to secure their jobs because its kingpin was most likely to succeed President Mugabe.
Team Lacoste and Generation 40 (G40) are the two camps in ZANU-PF. The former is campaigning for Mnangagwa to succeed the incumbent while the latter favours the status quo.
The “worried youths”, said Dzora was working closely with Goodson Nguni, a known Mnangagwa ally who works as the commissioner in charge of investigations at ZACC.
“Comrade secretary (Chombo), I (sic) bring to your attention serious interference by Mr Dzora and abuse of office to promote factionalism. Mr Dzora is working with Mr Nguni to promote factionalism. They are using Vice President Mnangagwa’s name and they are pressuring us as the Youth League secretariat to say we did not get any funding from ZIMDEF and Professor Moyo to support our programmes,” reads part of the letter, copied to the party’s national political commissar, Saviour Kasukuwere; secretary for youth affairs, Kudzai Chipanga; secretary for security, Sydney Sekeramayi; Moyo and Gandawa.

Vice President Emmerson Mnangagwa

The letter also accuses Dzora of being an ally of former vice president, Joice Mujuru, who was expelled from ZANU-PF on allegations of attempting to topple President Mugabe from power, unconstitutionally.
“Mr Dzora is offering us money and paying us to lie that Tongai Kasukuwere and Chipanga are covering up for Professor (Moyo), but the truth is that we got assistance from ZIMDEF…He is also saying we will get good jobs once VP Mnangagwa takes over from President Mugabe. As such, we are now divided since some are co-operating with Mr Dzora and Nguni in their plot to destroy Professor Moyo and Dr Gandawa accusing them as sponsors of President’s programmes and G40,” further reads the letter.
But a section of the Youth League believes the wing’s leadership was attempting to mislead ZACC and protect some of their colleagues who might have abused the fuel coupons sourced from ZIMDEF.
This group is arguing that while Moyo and Gandawa confirmed donating 100 000 litres of fuel coupons during the million man march organised by party youths in support of President Mugabe in May last year, there was no record at their offices showing that the donation reached its intended destination.
The furore has since claimed the scalp of Mupaya, who allegedly lost his job after informing ZACC investigators that he penned the letter to Chombo on behalf of the youths under duress.
Mupaya’s “confession” was said to have angered Chipanga; secretary for finance Tongai Kasukuwere; secretary for commissariat, Innocent Hamandishe; and secretary for administration, Xavier Kazizi, who then allegedly instigated his dismissal.
Mupaya confirmed to the Financial Gazette that he had indeed lost his job, but refused to shed more light.
“Please sir, I do not want to talk about that issue, thank you,” he said before terminating the phone call.
Kasukuwere, Hamandishe and Kazizi all declined to comment, referring questions to Chipanga.
“I do not want to comment on that matter. Talk to Chombo or (Dickson) Dzora who are in charge of party employees,” Chipanga said over the phone from his farm in Headlands.Efforts to get a comment from Chombo were futile.
Although Chombo has been ducking appointment requests from the Financial Gazette for the past two weeks and ignoring calls and messages to his mobile phone, sources close to him confided that he had received the letter, but decided to ignore it.
Dzora, who is said by sources to have strongly defended Mupaya, sought to downplay the issue, charging: “There are no such problems here. Where did you get that?”
Kasukuwere, Moyo and Gandawa confirmed receiving the letter from the “worried youths” yesterday while Sekeramayi, who is the secretary for defence in the Politburo promised to give his response after the Cabinet meeting. He was yet to do so by the time of going to print.
“It was delivered to my office secretary who signed for it. I only advised that it should be filed. I could not do anything about it since it was not addressed to me,” said Kasukuwere.
In an emailed response, Moyo said: “Yes I got a copy of the letter early last month and passed it on to my lawyers for their attention.”
In a telephone call Gandawa said: “I saw the letter and filed it.”

ZANU-PFs national political commissar, Saviour Kasukuwere

The Financial Gazette understands that things came to a head during the wing’s January 19 meeting to prepare for the 21st February Movement celebrations to mark President Mugabe’s 93rd birthday to be held in Matabeleland South’s Matobo district.
During the closed door meeting one of the youth delegates is said to have demanded transparency and accountability regarding donations that would be made towards the celebrations while citing the alleged case in which 100 000 litres of fuel donated by ZIMDEF for the million man march could not be accounted for.
Chombo, who had been invited to preside over the meeting, had to cool down tempers after youths started exchanging harsh words.
ZACC spokesperson, Phyllis Chikundura, refused to disclose details of the investigation, evasively saying: “ZACC is not doing anything about the alleged report. I hope this helps you in the article you are writing.”
She ignored further probing by the Financial Gazette.
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ZANU-PF national secretary for transport, Oppah Muchinguri

WARRING factions in the ruling party are burning the midnight oil to gain control of the 365 off-road vehicles and 10 buses acquired by ZANU-PF last year at a cost of about US$20 million in order to resource their proxies as they prepare for the ultimate battle in the race to succeed President Robert Mugabe.
The Financial Gazette can report that the succession wrangles between Generation 40 (G40) and Team Lacoste — the two factions in ZANU-PF — have shifted towards the allocation of party resources with strategic portfolios such as that for administration, finance and transport taking the centre stage.
As the 2018 elections draw closer, there is a strong feeling within the factions that whoever would gain control of Parliament and local authorities between them stands a good chance of swinging the succession pendulum in their favour.
Because most of the ZANU-PF cadres are thin on funding after nearly two decades of an economic recession, strategists on both sides of the factional divide have reasoned that the best way to oil their respective machineries would be to direct party resources towards their proxies so that they can mobilise supporters on the ground.
Both camps are now busy identifying candidates to take part in party primaries for the National Assembly and local authorities to be held early next year. Presently, there are manoeuvres among the key power brokers in ZANU-PF to ensure that their preferred candidates win the primaries so that they could be allocated party vehicles for use in advancing their factional agendas.
Thirty of the vehicles were dispatched to the party’s 10 provinces last month for allocation to chairpersons of the party’s three wings — the main wing, the Women’s League and the Youth League.
Each wing leader will be issued with a car to allow them to move around their provinces, conducting party business.
Provinces will get a bus each for use to transport party officials and supporters.
More vehicles would be given to those who would have emerged victorious in the party’s primary elections for both Parliament and local authorities.
As soon as the cars arrived in the provinces, pandemonium broke out in Masvingo and the Midlands provinces — bastions of support for Vice President Emmerson Mnangagwa, whom Team Lacoste would want to succeed the incumbent who is now in the twilight of his political career.
President Mugabe turns 93 on February 21.

Transport and Infrastructural Development Minister, Joram Gumbo

Team Lacoste kicked out Amasa Nenjana from the provincial chair of Masvingo last week and recalled Ezra Chadzamira while they brought in former deputy provincial chairman, Daniel Mackenzie Ncube to replace Joram Gumbo as head of the Midlands province.
Former Midlands chairman, Kizito Chivamba, who was suspended early last year, was prevented from resuming his duties because he was unwell.
Team Lacoste had lost control of Masvingo and the Midlands to their G40 rivals, but they have since regained them.
The faction is now plotting ways of smuggling back Joel Biggie Matiza in Mashonaland East province but could face a tricky situation because the camp could easily be overwhelmed by G40 there.
Team Lacoste members are also believed to be gunning for co-opted provincial Youth and Women’s League chairpersons, Nobert Ndaarombe and Veronica Makonese, respectively.
Still, G40 has an upper hand in most provinces and organs of the party where it succeeded in stampeding Mnangagwa’s allies out over the last two years.
To even things out, Team Lacoste is calling for elections in provinces that do not have substantive chairpersons for all the three wings although it is highly unlikely that there could be fresh elections, especially given G40’s vehement resistance.
ZANU-PF national secretary for transport, Oppah Muchinguri, said she had not received reports of squabbles over the vehicles.
“The cars are being distributed according to guidelines set out by the Politburo. We follow those guidelines and nothing else. If there are problems related to their use in the provinces, then we are yet to hear about them,” she said.
According to the guidelines, the vehicles will be handed over to the Provincial Executive Committee, which will then make respective allocations.
Nenjana refused to respond to questions when contacted by the Financial Gazette last Friday, shouting: “That has nothing to do with you,” over the phone.
When asked if it is true that the vehicles were at the centre of the catfight in Masvingo, Ndaarombe simply said: “Yes, the circumstances are not clear.”
He refused to say anything more, referring further questions to provincial political commissar, Jeppy Jaboon.
Jaboon, who is linked to G40, said he was not personally involved in the vehicles duel.
“It’s some of my colleagues (who are fighting for cars). I am still using the one which was issued to me during the 2013 election campaign. I can use that to access my constituency and do my commissariat work,” said the Bikita South Member of Parliament.
Makonese could not be reached for comment.
Politburo member and Masvingo Provincial Affairs Minister, Shuvai Mahofa, who was publicly accused by Nenjana, Makonese and Ndaarombe of instigating the former’s removal along with Psychomotor Minister, Josiah Hungwe, refused to entertain the Financial Gazette.
“I don’t want to talk to newspapers,” she said before terminating the call.
Hungwe was not responding to calls on his mobile phone this week.
Jorum Gumbo, the most senior ZANU-PF member in the Midlands province, said while it was possible that there could have been fights over control of the vehicles, such reports did not play a part in the province’s decision to co-opt Mackenzie Ncube.
Gumbo, believed to be one of those in Mnangagwa’s inner circle, was acting as Midlands chair until last Saturday. He was asked to act after the province resisted Tapiwa Matangaidze’s troubled interim chairmanship.
“I was acting chairman of the province when the Politburo cleared Chivamba and the other two chairmen (Chadzamira and Matiza). By virtue of the fact that they were cleared, we were given an opportunity to do what we could do as a province. We were free to choose the leadership we wanted and it was unanimously agreed that Ncube must take over and that is totally in order and not in violation of anything so I do not know why people should start making up stories. It is purely on this basis that the province arrived at that decision,” Gumbo said.
Mackenzie Ncube was not responding to calls on his mobile phone this week. He also did not respond to messages sent to him.
newsdesk@fingaz.co.zw

Rugare Gumbo

HIS full name is Rugare Eleck Ngidi Gumbo.
Loosely translated, his first name means peace, although his entire political life has been anything but peaceful.
Gumbo has had a political life punctuated by endless miseries and disappointments as he, at every turn, faced a series of arrests, suspensions, ridiculous electoral defeats and expulsions.
Last week, the seasoned politician was expelled from the Zimbabwe People First (ZPF) by its interim president, Joice Mujuru, whom, along with Didymus Mutasa, they had requested to lead the newly born party on an interim basis.
Coming two years after being ejected from ZANU-PF for hobnobbing with the same Mujuru, Gumbo’s latest predicament makes him a strong contender for a place in the Guinness Book of World Records as the most “harassed” politician the country has ever seen.
Born in Belingwe (now Mberengwa) district on February 8, 1940, Gumbo did his primary and secondary education in Masvingo, then Fort Victoria.
Historical records show that he started getting involved in active politics while staying in Masvingo, becoming a district chairman of ZAPU at the age of 22, in 1962.
As fate would have it, his entry into politics coincided with the enactment of the Law and Order Maintenance Act — a notorious law created by the Rhodesian government in its desperate attempt to douse the rising spirit of nationalism.
Gumbo’s crime was taking part in organising a general strike.
He was jailed for a few months, then flew to the United States on release.
He would spend the next decade pursuing university education in the US and Canada on bursaries before returning in 1973 to join the Zimbabwe African National Union (ZANU) in Zambia.
He easily distinguished himself as one of the few well-educated men to have joined the liberation struggle, popularly known as the Second Chimurenga.
His rise was meteoric, and so would be his fall a few years later.
He became secretary of information in the War Council (Dare ReChimurenga), ZANU’s external wing responsible for organising the war.
He worked under the chairmanship of Herbert Chitepo.
Two years after his return from the US, he was arrested and detained in March 1975 as one of the people who had been alleged to have taken part in the assassination of Chitepo.
He was imprisoned together with the likes of Simon Muzenda, Josiah Tongogara, Nathan Shamuyarira and Enos Nkala.
Like all ZANU nationalists, Gumbo then went to the newly independent Mozambique upon his release in late 1975.
This coincided with the release of many nationalists who had been serving lengthy prison sentences inside Zimbabwe, most notably Edgar Tekere and Robert Mugabe.
Meeting at Mgagao, Tanzania in 1976, members of the War Council declared President Mugabe their leader.
It would not be too long before trouble found Gumbo again.
In her book, Re-Living the Second Chimurenga — Memories from Zimbabwe’s Liberation Struggle, academic Fay Chung says Gumbo was arrested in 1976 after being involved in a botched coup attempt. There was great friction at the time between nationalists who were released from Zambia and those who were coming from Rhodesia.
Military men loyal to the Zambia group of nationalists expressed their discontentment by abducting Tekere and Herbert Ushewokunze.
They were led by a commander called Cletus Chigowe.
However, according to popular narratives, the coup was foiled by Rex Nhongo (the late army commander, Solomon Mujuru).
This was read as treason, resulting in the arrest of Gumbo, Mukudzei Mudzi, Henry Hamadziripi, Kumbirai Kangai and Steven Chocha (now police commissioner general, Augustine Chihuri).

Former vice president Joice Mujuru

They spent close to a year in underground dungeons that served as their prison cells.
Chung describes this episode as part of the deadly conflicts between guerrillas of peasant background with little formal education, who joined the movement in the 1960s and early 1970s, and the better-educated, left-wing youths, like Gumbo, who flocked to ZANU in the mid-1970s.
She analyses the rivalry between the military leaders and the better-educated political leaders who feared their power.
Chung describes the brutal purges of ZANU’s left wing in the mid-1970s, as the movement’s leaders unsuccessfully negotiated for a neo-colonial solution to the liberation struggle, showing how ZANU moved to the right as racism and tribalism were wielded as weapons against internal political enemies.
War veterans’ leader, Chris Mutsvangwa, himself now confined to the political wilderness after clashing with authorities in ZANU-PF, once claimed Gumbo was arrested for “trying to depose the party’s president during the liberation war”.
With Gumbo and his group having remained in prison until independence in 1980, memoirs from him will undeniably be a best seller.
That he has endured all these onslaughts and still come out of all the situations spiritually unscathed is the stuff of legends.
He has been defiant and he has always managed to plot and scheme his way back.
At independence, he suffered a series of Parliamentary defeats until the political gods smiled at him when he was voted senator for Mberengwa in the hotly disputed 2005 senatorial elections.
He then earned himself some ministerial appointments, first becoming minister of economic development before he was moved to the ministry of agriculture in 2007, in a Cabinet reshuffle in February of that year.
He lost his Cabinet position two years later in 2009 after having lost ZANU-PF primary elections for the 2008 general polls.
He, however, was appointed ZANU-PF national secretary for information and publicity at the ruling party’s congress held in December 2009.
He would lose that again five years later in 2014 after being accused of fanning factionalism by openly calling for the retirement of President Mugabe before the party’s December 2014 congress.
He was also accused of being part of a cabal that had plotted to assassinate the President. The cabal was alleged to have been led by Mujuru, who was at the time the second most powerful person in the country being ZANU-PF’s second secretary and the country’s first vice president.
Gumbo became the first high profile member of ZANU-PF to be kicked out of the party.
Never short of amusement, Gumbo made one of the most memorable political quotes in recent years as soon as he was expelled.
“Now I will be watching from the terraces and see what will happen,” he said.
Mutsvangwa, who had made himself chief aggressor, retorted that since the days of the liberation war, Gumbo had always been a “touch and go” guy who did not really contribute much to the liberation of the country.
Events of last week could, in a way, prove Mutsvangwa’s assertion.
This time, Gumbo was expelled from the very party he founded, by the very person he sacrificed his all while still in ZANU-PF.
On firing him, Mujuru accused Gumbo of being the heartbeat of a clique that sought to dethrone her from the helm of ZPF.
This is a popular script now in Zimbabwean politics.
And now, he is back again on the terraces, or maybe not.
Gumbo and his group, which includes former fellow founding fathers Didymus Mutasa and Kudakwashe Bhasikiti, have hit back at Mujuru and said they do not recognise her decisions.
Interesting times are, indeed, in the offing.
In the wake of the his latest predicament, the Financial Gazette sought out distinguished war veteran, Crispen Mataire, better known by his nom de guerre, David Todhlana, to understand what kind of a man Gumbo is.
Mataire was one of the Zimbabwe People’s Army (ZIPA) commanders who clashed with younger and more ambitious fighters under the command of Josiah Tongogara and also clashed with the new ZANU leadership in 1977.
He was arrested along with the likes of Wildred Mhanda, James Nyikadzinashe, Joseph Taderera and Elliot Pfepferere.
Gumbo and his group would be transferred to the same prison that housed ZIPA commanders in 1979.
Mataire surprisingly says Gumbo is not as divisive a character as he has appeared during his entire political career.
It is his brand of politics, he says, which is not compatible with the politics in Africa.
“We shared prison with him when they were transferred to Balama in June 1979. He is a very good man who cannot harm anyone, only that he is naturally bound to clash with those in power because he is someone who is outspoken and does not hesitate to speak his mind out regardless of whom it offends,” Mataire said.
“His arrest in 1976 was merely out of the fact that he had disagreed with both Tongogara and Mugabe who thought he was a threat to their power. Rex was also fighting Gumbo. This must also be the case now with Joice (Mujuru). But as far as I know him, he is a proper freedom fighter, who is not power hungry,” he added.
Mataire’s assertions could be true given Gumbo’s unwavering stubbornness.
When Gumbo takes a position, he will stand by that position.
This kind of stubbornness gives him the courage to take on anyone, no matter his situation.
It was evident in 1979 when he wrote a stinging treatise from prison about “The raging ZANU crisis and the emerging two-line struggle”.
It was evident in 2014 when, despite clearly facing the chop, Gumbo emerged, as ZANU-PF spokesperson, from a Politburo meeting — where his faction had taken serious battering, to tell the press a completely different story.
He would even spice it up with issues that had never taken place in the Politburo meeting.
newsdesk@fingaz.co.zw

Higher and Tertiary Education Minister Jonathan Moyo

HIGHER and Tertiary Education Minister Jonathan Moyo has written to Zimbabwe Republic Police (ZRP) commissioner-general Augustine Chihuri requesting him to investigate the Zimbabwe Anti-Corruption Commission (ZACC), which he accuses of using stolen documents to nail him in a corruption probe.
In a letter to Chihuri, the ZANU-PF Politburo member claims he was given a directive by Cabinet to seek police intervention in the matter.
“On Tuesday 20 December 2016, Cabinet directed that I bring to your attention suspected criminal use by The Sunday Mail on 18 December 2016, government documents stolen from our ministry’s offices. You will recall that on 6/7 August 2016, nine offices at the Ministry of Higher and Tertiary Education, Science and Technology Development were broken into and ransacked. Official documents and four laptop computers belonging to directors were stolen,” reads part of the letter.
“The affected offices included those of the minister, permanent secretary on the sixth floor and seven directors. The matter was reported to the ZRP,” he added.
Moyo then argued that the alleged stolen documents were handed over to the State-run weekly by ZACC in violation of the law.
“In the story headlined ‘ZACC digs in on Prof Moyo’ published on 18 December, (2016), The Sunday Mail alleged that ZACC is investigating a new case allegedly linking Professor Moyo and government officials to suspicious transactions involving US$6,4 million. The paper further claimed that documents showed that investigations into the latest case began last week after ZACC stumbled upon a number of suspicious transactions.
“It turns out from some of the examples of transactions cited in The Sunday Mail story that the documents which the paper claims to have seen and which ZACC is alleged to have stumbled upon leading to the start of a new investigation are among the documents that were stolen from the ministry when its offices were broken into on 6/7 August 2016. This revelation is the reason for this complaint which is being brought to your attention on the directive of Cabinet,” he further writes.
Moyo also wants police to probe ZACC’s alleged “criminal correspondence” with other third parties “in a manner similar to ZACC’s unlawful engagement with The Sunday Mail”.
“In one case last September, protected and confidential documents were illegally given by ZACC to a person not authorised to receive such documents. The ministry has evidence of this case and we believe a crime was committed,” he writes, without naming the person involved.  The letter, which was printed on a government letterhead and bears his official trademark signature, was copied to Home Affairs Minister, Ignatius Chombo, who could not be reached to confirm its reception.
Using illegally obtained evidence to investigate a suspect or bring them to trial is prohibited under section 258 of the Criminal Procedure and Evidence Act unless the State has “admitted it illegally obtained evidence and prove that it does not prejudice the right of an accused person to pursue a civil remedy for any breach of the law in consequence of which the evidence was obtained”.
Section 258 (A), which regulates admissibility or inadmissibility of illegally obtained evidence, states that:
(I) In determining, whether to exclude evidence that has been obtained in a manner that violates any provision of the Constitution, the court shall endeavour to strike a proper balance between;
(a) Safeguarding:
(i) the rights of the accused concerned; and
(ii) the integrity of the criminal justice system against serious or persistent breaches of the Law by the police or other employees of the State; and
(b) the public interest in-
(i) doing justice to the victim or victims of the crime in question.
The piece of legislation is a creation of section 70 (3) of the Constitution which reads: “In any criminal trial, evidence that has been obtained in a manner that violates any provision of this chapter (chapter four of the Constitution) must be excluded if the admission of evidence would render the trial unfair or would otherwise be detrimental to the administration of justice or the public interest.”
ZACC was still to respond to enquiries from the Financial Gazette at the time of going to print.
Contacted for comment yesterday, Moyo confirmed writing to the police.
“I can confirm that I reported the matter to the authorities on 20 December 2016 following an article in The Sunday Mail on 18 December which said: ‘ZACC had stumbled on documents’ among which we realised were some we knew had gone missing along with laptops after nine offices in our fifth and sixth floors had been broken into on 6/7 August 2016.
“The claim that ZACC ‘had stumbled’ on the documents was shocking in light of what we knew about the unprecedented break in at (the) Ministry and the fact that laptops and documents had been stolen on the day some of which were mentioned in The Sunday Mail story of 18 December 2016,” said Moyo.
National police spokesperson, Charity Charamba, requested questions to be sent to her via the short message service (SMS) saying she could not take calls on her mobile phone as she was attending a meeting.
She, however, did not respond to the SMSs despite persistent follow ups.
Her deputy, Paul Nyathi, said he was not at work and therefore could not assist with any information.
ZACC is pursuing Moyo and his deputy, Godfrey Gandawa, on allegations of abusing funds under the Zimbabwe Manpower Development Fund.
They both deny the allegations, saying they never used the money for personal benefit as alleged by ZACC but instead they used it to fund ZANU-PF activities, while some was donated to charity.
Moyo told Parliament on Tuesday that as part of its investigation, ZACC was breaking the law by using documents that were stolen from his ministry’s offices in August last year. Moyo and Gandawa were giving oral evidence before the Parliamentary Portfolio Committee on Higher and Tertiary Education, Science and Technology Development.

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