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Chinamasa is clueless
24 Sep 2014 at 22:14hrs | Views
Jacob Mafume, MDC renewal team spokesperson, has labelled Finance minister Patrick Chinamasa as a clueless chap who does not even know when the mid-term fiscal statement should be presented.
This comes after Chinamasa has been struggling to raise enough funds for the national budget since taking over as Finance minister.
"We have a clueless minister who thinks September is in the middle of the year," Mafume told journalists at the Bulawayo Press Club on Saturday.
"He cannot define the middle of a year. We have a chap who has grown old to such an extent that he cannot tell whether the year is in the middle, in the beginning or at end and that is why he comes up with a mid-term statement at the end of September.
"In fact, he should have given us a budget not a statement."
Chinamasa ruffled legislators when he raised a raft of taxes in a speech to Parliament outside protocol and later asked the House to forgive his misdirection.
Zanu PF spokesperson Rugare Gumbo defended Chinamasa, saying his actions had precedents even though that failed to calm down the MPs.
"That is ridiculous," Mafume said. "That term is not a euphemism, it's not an English expression, it simply says what it says."
Mafume accused Chinamasa of trying to use common sense in running the nation.
"He does not know that there are rules of economics, he is having expenditure overruns; he is failing to meet the budget. He is now taxing everyone," he said.
Mafume said Zimbabwe has a leadership crisis coupled with a bloated cabinet that is "in the intensive care."
"How can they deal with a modern world when their aspirations are discordant?" asked Mafume.
Referring to the recent tax increase proposals by Chinamasa, Mafume said: "Like the biblical Lazarus, we are the poor eating crumbs and now the rich men at the top table are now demanding tax from the crumbs."
Meanwhile, former Finance Minister Tendai Biti yesterday described Finance Minister Patrick Chinamasa's mid-term fiscal policy statement as feja-feja economics because Chinamasa was spending money that the government did not have and was literally printing the United States dollar.
This comes after Chinamasa has been struggling to raise enough funds for the national budget since taking over as Finance minister.
"We have a clueless minister who thinks September is in the middle of the year," Mafume told journalists at the Bulawayo Press Club on Saturday.
"He cannot define the middle of a year. We have a chap who has grown old to such an extent that he cannot tell whether the year is in the middle, in the beginning or at end and that is why he comes up with a mid-term statement at the end of September.
"In fact, he should have given us a budget not a statement."
Chinamasa ruffled legislators when he raised a raft of taxes in a speech to Parliament outside protocol and later asked the House to forgive his misdirection.
Zanu PF spokesperson Rugare Gumbo defended Chinamasa, saying his actions had precedents even though that failed to calm down the MPs.
Mafume accused Chinamasa of trying to use common sense in running the nation.
"He does not know that there are rules of economics, he is having expenditure overruns; he is failing to meet the budget. He is now taxing everyone," he said.
Mafume said Zimbabwe has a leadership crisis coupled with a bloated cabinet that is "in the intensive care."
"How can they deal with a modern world when their aspirations are discordant?" asked Mafume.
Referring to the recent tax increase proposals by Chinamasa, Mafume said: "Like the biblical Lazarus, we are the poor eating crumbs and now the rich men at the top table are now demanding tax from the crumbs."
Meanwhile, former Finance Minister Tendai Biti yesterday described Finance Minister Patrick Chinamasa's mid-term fiscal policy statement as feja-feja economics because Chinamasa was spending money that the government did not have and was literally printing the United States dollar.
Source - dailynews
