Zim News Blog -NEWS NETWORK

Source: Govt rejects criticism  of slow cyclone response | Daily News

President Emmerson Mnangagwa’s government — widely condemned for its slow response to Cyclone Idai — said yesterday it had reacted swiftly to the disaster and was on ground to coordinate rescue efforts, with security agencies  busy  trying to open access routes and save the marooned.

Information, Publicity and Broadcasting Services deputy minister Energy Mutodi said State media had given plenty of advance warning of the cyclone, which left 89 dead over 100 missing and thousands of others destitute.

He said government did not have the capacity to evacuate everyone.
“Warnings were issued to people through the meteorological services department and those residing in affected areas were supposed to seek shelter in safer zones, but you know people normally do not want to leave their homes. Government did not have enough to vacate everyone,” Mutodi said.

The government public defence came after three days of criticism of its relief effort, including a rebuke from the main opposition who said hundreds died because government had been slow to act.
Civil society, parliamentarians and foreign aid groups have criticised the government’s handling of the crisis as slow and unresponsive, a view echoed by many bitter cyclone survivors in the hardest-hit Manicaland area.

But government said it had held an emergency meeting and dispatched ministers including Local Government, Public Works and National Housing minister July Moyo. Lands, Agriculture, Water, Climate and Rural Resettlement minister and acting Defence minister Perrance Shiri, Public Service, Labour and Social Welfare minister Sekai Nzenza and Transport and Infrastructural Development minister Joel Biggie Matiza to oversee the relief effort after the cyclone.

Days after one of Zimbabwe’s biggest cyclone disasters, some people affected by the cyclone are yet to receive help from the government, or international or local aid groups.
Damage to bridges and roads was said to be hampering delivery of aid, with little or no relief reaching isolated areas.

The main opposition MDC led by Nelson Chamisa, who visited the disaster-hit-areas of Chipinge and Chimanimani yesterday, accused the Mnangagwa government of being “deaf and dumb” to pleas to prepare for the cyclone.

Chamisa, through his spokesperson Nkululeko Sibanda, said the disaster should not have claimed so many lives considering that warnings about the cyclone were issued well in advance.
“A disaster that you are warned about 48 hours in advance should have killed far fewer people, given its magnitude. There should not have been a rescue effort. There should have been an evacuation exercise,” he said, adding he will “also assist some of those in need of food and blankets.”

“We must pray for our country,” he said.
The opposition party has appealed to all Zimbabweans to use all means necessary to help the victims.
Independent Norton legislator Temba Mliswa has also questioned the Civil Protection Unit(CPU)’s response to natural disasters, suggesting that more should have been done besides warnings given.

CPU issued a statement and sent people messages advising them to take precaution, citing increased risk of flooding and damage to homes and infrastructure.

“If CPU is failing to be effective in the midst of the current disaster despite the warnings, what is the point? What measures did they take to predict, prepare for and reduce the effects of cyclone Idai? If they’re under resourced have they presented a budget to fiscus for funds?” Mliswa said.

Election Resource Centre (ERC) boss Tawanda Chimhini said after similar disasters that the country has experienced, government should have put in place measures to ensure that lives are not lost where avoidable.
“A lot of these disasters that we have faced are disasters that could be managed if proper efforts are made. The current situation that Zimbabweans are going through is really unfortunate and we don’t want to politicise the whole process but I think being fully prepared for future disasters such as these should be a priority.

“It is only essential for government to say in the event of this happening again, we have put certain measures in place. A lot of us knew that the cyclone was coming but what did we do? That should underline the principle for accountability,” Chimhini said.

The post Govt rejects criticism  of slow cyclone response appeared first on Zimbabwe Situation.

Source: Chamisa mauls Mwonzora ally | Daily News

MDC leader Nelson Chamisa railed at party secretary-general Douglas Mwonzora’s ally in Masvingo last weekend, blaming him for the opposition party’s poor showing in the region during last year’s harmonised elections.

The MDC won only one parliamentary seat in Masvingo out of a possible 26 in the July 30, 2018 elections in which Chamisa narrowly lost the presidential race to President Emmerson Mnangagwa of Zanu PF.

Chamisa who came to the helm of the country’s biggest opposition party following the death of founding MDC president Morgan Tsvangirai last year is likely to be challenged by Mwonzora and party vice president Elias Mudzuri at the congress.

Mwonzora and Mudzuri have both expressed their willingness to take the charismatic 41-year-old lawyer head-on at the forthcoming elective congress if nominated.

Addressing MDC structures in Masvingo ahead of the much-awaited congress scheduled for May 24 to 26 at a yet-to-be announced venue, Chamisa launched a scathing attack on James Gumbi — the provincial chairperson who is aligned to the Mwonzora camp — for letting the party down.

“In Masvingo, we lost dismally (in last year’s elections). The chairperson did not do much to campaign for the party hence the poor showing,” Chamisa said.

Gumbi, who has been a thorn in the MDC leader’s backside, might have worsened his situation when he recently told the Daily News that he did not see anything wrong with Zanu PF deputy youth league chairperson Lewis Matutu predicting a Mwonzora victory against Chamisa.

Chamisa, who also hails from Gutu in Masvingo, hinted at the weekend of possible change of guard in the region.
“We want to rejuvenate the party and reclaim our seats we once won in 2008. In last elections, we only won one seat in the whole province,” Chamisa, who was in the company of Mwonzora, Mudzuri and national organising secretary Amos Chibaya, among other senior party leaders, said.

This comes amid reports that Chamisa is keen on former deputy youth minister Tongai Matutu taking over the reins from Gumbi when the provincial congress is held.

With Matutu eyeing the post of provincial chairperson, what the president did was to show the party structures the direction he wants the elections to go because he does not trust Gumbi after his alleged role in the controversy surrounding the Masvingo mayor,” a regional source told the Daily News on condition of anonymity.

Chamisa views Masvingo mayor Collen Maboke as a product of some clandestine arrangement he had with Zanu PF, which led the MDC official to defy a party directive to have its preferred candidate, Godfrey Kurauone, for the position of mayor.

It is alleged that Maboke struck a secret trade off deal with Zanu PF councillors for the position of deputy mayor in exchange for their votes for the mayoral position.

Chamisa contends that with three councillors out of 10, Zanu PF stood no chance of taking the deputy mayoral position had it not been for the bargain and the backing he allegedly got from Gumbi as provincial chairperson.
As a result, the MDC has been exerting pressure on the mayor to step down.

At the meeting, Chamisa gave Maboke a week to resign or face expulsion from the MDC and lose his council seat.
Contacted for comment, Gumbi said he did not know why the MDC leader attacked him.
“I’m not sure how that came about but you can call me later in the day,” he said.
He was, however, not taking calls when further attempts to contact him were made.

At the weekend meeting, the MDC leader said the party had since dropped the name MDC Alliance to revert back to just the MDC.
“We are resorting to our original name, the MDC. We are no longer MDC Alliance. The alliance addition was for the elections to distinguish ourselves,” he said referring to the integration of former secretary-general Tendai Biti’s People’s Democratic Party (PDP) and Welshman Ncube’s MDC last year.

“Like the late leader Morgan Tsvangirai said, we should unite and come back. The likes of Biti and (Welshman) Ncube are back and there is no longer PDP, we are now one huge family.”

He also warned party officials against unbridled ambition saying “people must learn that being big-headed does not pay. Look now (Thokozani) Khupe is nothing more than a crocodile pawn,” Chamisa said, implying the MDC-T leader could be working with President Emmerson Mnangagwa whose nickname is “crocodile.”

The post Chamisa mauls Mwonzora ally appeared first on Zimbabwe Situation.

Source: #Latest: CycloneIdai- Police rescue teams stuck – NewsDay Zimbabwe March 19, 2019

Dozens of police officers deployed for a search and rescue mission in the cyclone- hit Chimanimani were on Tuesday stuck at Rutengeni, several kilometres from the affected areas, as repairs on a damaged part of the road took more than half a day to complete.

By Everson Mushava/Tapiwa Zivira

At the time of writing, dozers and graders were paving a detour to create way for the police and other traffic moving to and from Chipinge and Chimanimani, which are most affected areas.

“We have been here since morning. We travel to the affected areas everyday and return to camp at Changadzi,” said one of the officers who is part of the pool of cops drawn from various Support Unit troops, and camped at Changadzi, outside Birchenough Bridge.

About 98 people have have been confirmed dead and over 217 unaccoubted for after Cyclone Idai hit the eastern part of the country since weekend, leaving a trai of destruction in Chimanimani, Chipinge and Bikita, among other areas.

Most people unaccounted for were washed away by the flash floods after torrential rains forced some river banks to burst. Most families are devastated and waiting closure on what happened to their missing relatives.

The police officer added: “Today looks like a wasted day because its already noon and the road repairs are yet to be completed.”

Travellers where stranded at the Rutengeni area where earth movers were busy preparing the detour after a patch became impassable. A queue over vehicles intenring to pass streached several kikometres on each side.

Water levels in most rivers had subsided in the partly sunny weather with threats of more rains.

The post #Latest: CycloneIdai- Police rescue teams stuck  appeared first on Zimbabwe Situation.

IF you thought Vimbai Zimuto would stop posting racy nudes just because she’s presently in Zimbabwe, then sorry, because she’s just done it again. Vimbai, who flew in on Sunday from the Netherlands where she’s based so that she can finishing recording her upcoming videos, says nudity is art. In her latest photo, she sits […]

IT was an opportunity for an easy and natural script for a prison break when Cyclone Idai blew off the roofs of four cells at Mutimurefu Prison, located about 25km from Masvingo City, on Saturday morning. The prisoners had been given all the leeway – literally – and a possible prison escape had come on […]