'How can a frightened Mutasa rush to protect Mugabe,' asks Jonathan Moyo

Information minister Jonathan Moyo questioned how "a petrified Mutasa" would have sought to protect the Zanu-PF leader President Mugabe following rumours that Mugabe had lost the elections to Tsvangirai.

Former party secretary for administration Didymus Mutasa told South Africa's Sunday Independent paper that he had to "personally" offer President Robert Mugabe security after the first round of the 2008 elections.

"How could a frightened Mutasa rush to State House to protect President Mugabe after 2008 polls? We know he went (into) hiding!," Moyo queried.

Addressing Zanu-PF supported in Headlands before the 10 June by-elections, Vice President Emmerson Mnangagwa claimed that after the 2008 election results he called Mutasa who had fled Harare for his rural home of Rusape.



As regards the Gukurahundi atrocities that Mutasa claims he was not aware of, the Information minister, who reports say lost a relative in the decade-long State-sponsored violence that targeted Matabeleland and parts of Midlands provinces, pointed out that Mutasa would have known about the atrocities as he was head of the country's legislature.

"Mutasa says he didn't know of Gukurahundi as he was Parliament Speaker in Harare yet PF Zapu told all in Parliament!," Moyo said.

But Mutasa maintained he was never briefed, saying that Moyo could check with parliamentary records.

"They can always check with the Hansard (official National Assembly publication), I did not know about that (Gukurahundi)," Mutasa said.

Reports claim that some 20 000 civilians were callously murdered by the North Korean-trained 5th Brigade unleashed by Mugabe, then Prime Minister, to "quell" the disturbances blamed on a handful of "bandits" allegedly linked to the late PF Zapu leader Joshua Nkomo who was later to become Vice-President.