Mwonzora rubbishes Mafume's claims that he wrote fake letters to recall 21 MPs

MDC-T SECRETARY general Douglass Mwonzora rubbished the claims by the MDC Renewal team' spokesperson Jacob Mafume that the letters which he wrote to parliament and rebel house of assembly and senate members were fake describing the spokeperson as desperate to protect the members from expulsion.

The MDC-T on Tuesday served the 21 members of parliament who joined the MDC-Renewal recall letters during the parliamentary seating in Harare.

But Mafume had said it appears that Mwonzora caused excitement among non-lawyers in his party by producing fake letters claiming they were from parliament.

"Now the man has a history of writing fake letters, a High Court judgment even or is it alleged -no matter. The man writes a letter and places them in the pigeon holes of parliament. The man proceeds to state that they are from parliament and his side -kicks without thinking proceed to parrot the statement.

"For the avoidance of doubt Mwonzora is not the Speaker of Parliament nor does he correspondent for Parliament. Now you have political analysts saying Parliament delivered letters –no it did not."

He said placing letters and petitions in pigeon holes of parliamentarians is standard practice in a democracy and does not mean that they have been delivered by Parliament.

"Now this man Mwonzora for the uninitiated will have you dance a merry dance all night long," said Mafume. "A clumsy attempt of copying what Zanu PF did with (Didymas) Mutasa and (Temba) Mliswa, all in the hope of achieving a self-fulfilling prophecy to nowhere. What then if you achieve that??? Is the million dollar question. The spirit of renewal cannot be killed. The smell of renewal is as certain as the fresh smell of roasted maize or the smell of ripened tobacco on the auction floor."

But Mwonzora yesterday rubbished Mafume's claims saying the 21 MPs were recalled by the MDC-T following the party Congress held between October 31 and November 1 2014's resolution.

"The bases of the recall is that they have expelled themselves by joining another  political party called MDC Renewal which is contemplating to  transform to be UMDC which the two parties are different from the MDC- Tsvangirai," said Mwonzora. "The law is very clear that if a member of parliament seizes to belong to a political party that brought him or her to parliament, he or she can be recalled. So all these members of parliament went to parliament on an MDC-T ticket and they seized to belong to it and must surrender to it."

He said as a secretary general on behalf of the party (MDC-T) he wrote the letters of recall of the MPs to both speaker of parliament ad senate president.

"These date stamped accordingly letters were delivered to the clerk of parliament," said Mwonzora. "On March 4, 2015 I wrote letters to each individual member of parliament concerned, informing them of the recall. Some of the letters were delivered to those members through the caucus   secretary of the MDC-T Tafadzwa Gutu and the Chief Whip Innocent Gonese."

He said those letters have the MDC-T letter head and are signed by him.

"Therefore they cannot be fake," said Mwonzora.

MDC-Renewal chairperson Samuel Sipepa Nkomo on Tuesday confirmed that some members had received letters, but dismissed the purported expulsion.

 "That is fiction. Can you be fired by an organisation you do not belong to? You cannot get a letter from a certain organisation or company saying you have been expelled from your workplace," said Sipepa Nkomo. "It does not happen that way."

A defiant Nkomo said they will be in Parliament today, arguing that Mwonzora could not expel them.

"We cannot be fired by an illegitimate secretary-general who does not belong to our party," he said. "It's just daydreaming.

Nkomo's wife, Roseline, said she think the MDC-T can try that, but her group was the one that expelled the MDC-T leaders.

She said by planning to expel the renewal team members MDC-T will be donating the seats they held to Zanu PF.

But Mwonzora dismissed all Nkomo and his wife's claims as ignorance of how the law works.

"I was not expelled from the MDC-T," said Mwonzora. "Political parties' leadership is determined by congresses not by any other bodies. The congress of the MDC-T elected leaders including myself. The other people now into UMDC and Renewal were advised of the date and venue of the congress but chose not to come. So the assertion by those members shows lake of appreciation of political party processes that is why they resort to verbal abuse."

Mwonzora said after the letters were delivered to parliament and individual MPs they were waiting for the speaker of parliament to be there and he understands he will be there next week.

He said the claims that by recalling the renewal team members from parliament were like donating eats to Zanu PF were made by people who lake knowledge.

"The MDC Renewal and anybody else are free to contest those seats. We are definitely not donating those seats. MDC Renewal is not different to Zanu PF to us as they are all opponents," he said.

A total of 21 legislators dumped Tsvangirai's party and set up MDC-Renewal. Both factions claim to be the legitimate opposition.