A clerk stormed into the September hearing of the industry and international trade portfolio committee, which was gathering evidence about corruption at the state-run Zimbabwe Iron and Steel Company (Zisco). Obert Mpofu, the Minister of Industry and International Trade, was testifying. He had just declared that there was a ”shocking … thick file” implicating people in high places.
The clerk’s message: acting president Joice Mujuru wanted to have an ”urgent” meeting with Mpofu and his team.
The hearing was halted. Three weeks later it emerged that Mujuru ”may have had key information” about the scandal the committee was probing. A report into alleged corruption at Zisco involving senior politicians has already pointed the finger at many of Mujuru’s close allies.
One of the country’s worst corruption scandals, which is being referred to as Ziscogate, is shaking President Robert Mugabe’s 26-year-old government. Its tremors are being felt far and wide, and Mugabe is under increasing pressure from certain members of his Cabinet to take action against Cabinet members and ruling Zanu-PF party officials who are implicated.
In a three-hour presentation, Justice Minister Patrick Chinamasa advised Mugabe during a Cabinet meeting this week that there was ”prima facie evidence of perjury against Mpofu”, that ”Cabinet members were involved [in the Zisco scandal]”, and that Parliamentary Speaker John Nkomo should be given a chance to appoint the parliamentary privileges and immunity committee to get to the bottom of Ziscogate.
Chinamasa was reportedly emphatic: ”Nothing should be swept under the carpet,” sources privy to Cabinet deliberations told the Mail & Guardian this week.
Intelligence officials advised Mugabe last month that releasing the report would damage his government and create a ”confidence crisis”.
The new intriguing twist to the saga is how the politics of succession within the ruling Zanu-PF party — which pits Vice-President Mujuru and Rural Housing Minister Emmerson Mnangagwa against one another — is affecting whether or not the truth about what happened at Zisco will come out.
It emerged this week that a confidential and controversial National Economic Conduct Inspectorate (Neci) report into corruption at Zisco implicates members of a faction aligned to retired General Solomon Mujuru, the kingmaker within the ruling party, and his wife, Mujuru, in the Zisco scandal, saying they are ”in it to the neck”. Neci is a probe team within the ministry of finance.
According to a parliamentarian and member of the international trade and industry committee, a lot of high-ranking government officials in Mujuru’s camp ”will go to jail if God and the law choose to be fair”.
The committee also believes that the Mujurus; Tirivanhu Mudariki, a business associate and relative of the Mujurus and former Zanu-PF MP; and Leo Mugabe, Mugabe’s nephew and Zanu-PF MP, are among high-ranking figures who should ”cooperate with information” surrounding Ziscogate.
Meanwhile, a faction aligned to Mujuru advised Mugabe two weeks ago in a Cabinet meeting that opposition Movement for Democratic Change parliamentarians within Enoch Porusingazi’s industry and international trade committee are behind attempts to nail party politicians.
Then, in a heated Cabinet meeting this week, members who support Mnangagwa emphasised that ”nothing should be swept under the carpet” and that as ”politicians they should lead by example”.
”We said down with corruption, so we should walk the talk,” the source privy to the Cabinet deliberations said. Mujuru is considered to be the heir apparent, but the political terrain is fast changing as allegations of corruption in her political camp emerge.
Mujuru is believed to have already rubbed up potential allies in the party the wrong way. Among them are senior politicians who backed her against Mnangagwa in 2004 in the three Matabeleland provinces. ”She has since lost their trust and confidence after sending signals that she would back Mpofu for the vice-presidency when she gets into office,” Zanu-PF insiders said.
Matabeleland kingpins within Zanu-PF, Vice-President Joseph Mica and Nkomo were upset by this. Nkomo did not come to Mpofu’s defence when the parliamentary committee recommended last week that Parliament charge Mpofu with perjury over his testimony on the Zisco affair.
”[Mujuru] cannot count on the support of Msika and Nkomo in Matabeleland any more,” said the source.