Minister's venom at the funeral of a Chief disgraceful

ZAPU,the Zimbabwe African People's Union is stunned by the apparent lack of discipline and the disrespect in the ruling party as evidenced by the utterances of Matabeleland South Provincial Minister who clearly disrespected the decision of Vice President  Mphoko recently.


Speaking at the funeral of the late Chief Masuku Minister A Ncube lambasted the farm owner Mr. Peter Cunningham and the entire community of Matopo claiming that the people were submitting themselves to slavery by the farmer. Apparently Cunningham's farm houses a number of projects that are run by and benefit massively the community. According to Ncube these communities should have allowed Mr. Mashingaidze to get the farm instead of refusing that this one individual takes the whole farm to himself and condemn them to worse poverty and more painful misery. Minister Ncube is reported to have venomously attacked the entire community prompting Chief Nyangazonke to stand with the defenceless population and the farmer.

What is really funny about the Minister's attack is that Vice President Mphoko visited the area during the days of the debate about the farm. He instructed that Mr. Mashingaidze should be given another farm so that the community based projects on the farm beneficial to the people are allowed to continue. The furious Minister waited for the death of one traditional leader who stood firm with the people at the time to unleash the horrific attack. He shamelessly challenged his superior during bereavement. Could this be the result of factionalism in the now torn-between political party or this Minister is just too excited to a point where he disrespected his senior in public? Or is it, as it is typical of Zanupf the Minister had nothing to say but found insulting the whole community the only thing to say and in the process, he openly disregarded the Vice President of his Government?

The people of Matopo do not really care about the indiscipline or the factionalism in that party as it is obvious that any party that cherishes dictatorship does not care about respecting its seniors especially in public. What is of concern is this rejection of the Vice President's resolve of the issue.  Will we then see a restart to push out Cunningham and the community so that one individual that Ncube wants benefits from the infrastructure? Are the dreams of those defenceless Zimbabweans going to be shattered once again as Minister Ncube defies the second man in command in the whole country just for the pleasure of Mr. Mashingaidze?

 The Minister's utterance exposes once more Zanu PF's philosophy of individualism which is a manifestation of the evil politics of patronage. To this man there is probably only one person who must have a final say. If any leader solves a problem based on the situation on the ground as long as the individual does not benefit, then this must be denounced even at a funeral.  This is evidence once more that only devolution of power is the way. Devolution will insist that everyone at every level has a right to be involved in participating in the decision-making process that affects their lives. Collective leadership is the only one that is progressive and not worshipping an individual.

Minister Ncube must know however that if his intention was to just intimidate the community through insults as usual, the people no longer fear these political or psychological tantrums thrown at them willy-nilly by the ZanuPF provincial leadership that now publicly goes against its own senior leadership. Zapu is always with the victims of repression hence together with them insults from disrespectful Ministers will be resisted. We salute the traditional leadership whose concern is the plight of the impoverished citizens.

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Mkhululi Zulu: Department of Publicity and Information