DARE unpacks the Students Solidarity Trust saga

Statements — By on November 22, 2010 2:01 am

Revolutionary greetings to all the comrades of our struggle against oppression, corruption, nepotism and dictatorship. Having been away from the public scene for quite a long time, we are pleased as Dare to be back and share with you our frustrations with this class project that is furthering the interests of their political masters based in Washington and London.

Dare notes with great concern the disturbing tribulations befalling the Students Solidarity Trust. The happenings at SST are just a tip in the iceberg of how donor funds have been misused under the guise of fighting for democracy and human rights in Zimbabwe.  As the events unfolded, Dare was forced to call for an extraordinary indaba to discuss top on the agenda the ugly events at the SST.

As genuine fellows of the trust, we very much feel betrayed by the way the organisation has been run notably by the pint sized Masimba Nyamanhindi. To all of you who know the history of the liberation struggle you are all aware of the famous Morrison Nyathi, who sold out resulting in the massacre of thousands of guerrillas in Mozambique.

Dare mourns and remembers all those who sacrificed their lives in the odious journey to attain total independence. Not forgetting that our own Masimba is from the Nyathi totem, the spirit of selling out seems to be running in their veins. At our extraordinary indaba DARE noted that there was but a common denominator underlying the whole saga.

Dare noted how and why the  SST was formed by a group of young student activists who had fallen victim to the ZANU PF machinery through suspensions, expulsions and arrests, to cushion students whenever their rights are violated. Dare is  saddened  to realise how certain individuals have tried successfully to hoodwink western donors that the SST is an NGO that belongs to only former  MSU students, who all of them have proved beyond any reasonable doubt that they are incompetent administrators and a bunch of thieves who thrive on a patronage system that only benefit their own.

We are not saying that students from MSU lack capacity, but the fact here is that those at the SST have proved beyond doubt not only to be dull but shallow. After thorough debating Dare singled out the  main culprit in the whole saga a one pot bellied, globe eyed boy from Zambia  called McDonald Lewanika who seems not to understand the basic principles of corporate governance. Noting his lack of knowledge as you all know that the alien boy is illiterate, his leadership style at the SST was disaster to say the least, as he ran it like a grinding mill. 

As coordinator of the Trust, we should not forget that Mcdee left a culture of patronage, employing his relatives and fellow MSU colleagues. DARE will try to make a fair analysis of how Mcdee as coordinator of the SST, manufactured the problems we are now facing in our beloved organisation. The issue of Trust Mutowe is smaller than the real issues at hand at our organisation. The issues affecting the SST, are purely administrative and a manifestation of problems authored by the unethical Zambian boy, Mcdee.

When we formed the SST, we entrusted this comrade to be the coordinator of our beloved Trust, not knowing that he would take it away from fellows and subsequently turning it into his personal property.  It should be noted that when he was appointed to be the coordinator of the Trust, it was not because there were no other comrades competent enough to take on the task, but rather because fellows then present had gotten opportunities to take on more demanding tasks in the struggle, and the SST then was just one of those small jobs which it was thought could be led by any fellow for as long as they had been ‘victims of the struggle’ at colleges and for as long as they understood why the organization was in existence.

As the victims of the struggle in the colleges grew in number and as the fight for democracy in Zimbabwe intensified, the organization also grew and instead of investing in the human capital of competent fellows who had then managed to attain respectable qualification, Mcdee decided to recruit and surround himself with his fellow protégés-cum-bootlickers from the MSU. And when he left the SST he left his most obedient ‘son Nyamanhindi to take over the reins as he has continued to have heavy and ever-present hand over what transpires at the SST.

It is only a case of the chickens coming home to roost as we hear that the Management Committee at Crisis in Zimbabwe Coalition are now investigating how Mcdee as the Chairperson of the Crisis board flouted recruitment procedures, resigning from the Board to appoint himself as the Coordinator of the same organization, ‘Crisis in Zimbabwe Coalition,’ whose name by the way has outlived its existence.

We wonder what those who sat at the strategic planning held at the flamboyant Pandari Lodge in September were really doing? It is really funny how donors as we know them for their strict corporate governance ethics will allow and pretend not to see such things as they transpire before their very wide eyes. Talk about double standards.

Staff Recruitment

Masimba Nyamanhindi-The former Marist Brothers student was taken from the abysses of poverty while working as an intern at MMPZ together with the gorilla looking Sizani Weza (currently with the US Embassy’s Public Affairs Section). At the MMPZ, Masimba became friends with Weza,( who later became SST Board Treasurer).  As Board Treasurer, Weza worked in  connivance with Masimba  giving  each other personal loans that were never returned to the organisation.

Obviously after learning the ropes from the sex –loving Weza, whose policy is that of a leg for a job, Nyamanhindi became a master of the forbidden game.  After the departure of Mcdee from SST, Mcdee single handedly picked Masimba to succeed him as coordinator, without conducting any interview for the vacancy of the post that had been left void. Despite Masimba not possessing any competent academic documents to fill the post of coordinator as was now required, the short boy just lacked the charisma and humbleness to lead the organisation.

He will be remembered at the SST for notoriously soliciting for sex to every female intern who worked for the SST. Who doesn’t know his affair with a former intern Adeline. In 2009, he clandestinely took this girl on a sex cruise to the Gordern Moyo’s Ideas Festival in Bulawayo. The issue brew ire from fellow SST employees who also wanted to be part of the trip. It should also be said that amongst fellows the first person to complain and raise an issue on that matter is none other than Trust Mutowe, who today is being persecuted for that incident of the past.

At that time not only did Nyamanhindi’s fellow employees complain about this all-expenses trip because they could no longer be a part of it, fellows like Trust who were employed as part of the Rapid Response team had to forego their salaries for that months to cater for the trip. This girl Adeline, with known connections to the CIO, was later bought a car (a Nissan March model, red in colour) by Masimba as a big thank you and send off as she returned to school.

Those who dared to resist his sexual  advances would suffer the consequences. He will also go down in the history books for buying three cars in a space of two years while fellows could go for two months without receiving their $50 monthly stipend.

Recommendation- The Indaba recommended that Nyamanhindi be immediately recused of his duties to pave way for an audit on the SST accounts by an Independent Auditor appointed by us fellows because of reasonable suspicion that he mis-appropriated SST funds. DARE also recommended that the post of coordinator be declared vacant to pave way for a fresh, open and transparent process that allows  fellows with the necessary qualifications and experience run the organisation. Never again will we accept our beloved organisation to be run by people who lack basic knowledge of reasoning like Masimba Nyamanhindi and colleagues.

Simba Moyo

The gay activist from Zvishavane, is now the Programs Manager of the SST despite his seven year struggle to complete his law degree with distance learning with UNISA. Jah Rapid as he is affectionately known is a known failure in many aspects. Apart from an outstanding record of failing in his exams at UNISA, he has failed as CHRA Chairperson. With all the problems facing the city of Harare, Moyo seems pre-occupied by sodomising young male CHRA activists,  whom he pays from the loot from SST.

Recommendation- For sleeping with other men Simba has not only tarnished our image as God fearing people, but an uncultured people who do not have respect for our traditional values and ethics.  Dare recommended that he be fired from SST. We further task Dare to find out from CHRA if it is their organisational policy that men sleeps with other men, as far as we believe it remains an act of abomination and against the law.

Darlington Madzonga

After years of frustration he had to protest by forcibly taking keys to the SST office and stayed with them for some days forcing McDonald to offer him a job despite lack of capacity. Now that he has found comfort with the loot, Madzonga seems to have quickly forgotten that he once fought the elitist system created by Mcdee.  His unquenchable thirst for ladies of the night is quiet alarming. Go to the Portugal Restaurant (PINSAO), and you will realise that the man is a popular figure amongst the prostitute community. This is mainly because of his well known record by ladies of the night for not being a stingy customer.

Recommendation-The Pinsao Hustler should stay as a librarian, his former job. With all fairness he is the most qualified for the job and as fellows we are all in agreement that this Pinsao guy used to show talent in arranging books for other intelligent fellows to read at the SST resource centre.

Brighton Mavhusa (former SST finance officer, now Crisis finance officer)

Having attended high school with Mcdee at St John’s College, Brighton was taken from the broke ZUPCO to become the Finance Officer at SST. As head of the finance, Brighton was strategically positioned to steal money from the Trust for their personal use. As Chairperson of Crisis Mcdee flouted recruitment procedures and scandalously awarded himself the Director’s job, again transferring his friend Brighton to take over from the late Sajeni (May his soul rest in peace) as finance officer at Crisis.

Does it mean they were no other competent finance people apart from Brighton. It is the same way in which Brighton (of a known state-inclination) facilitated the plunder and abuse of ZUPCO funds while he worked in the Accounts department during the dark era when ZANU PF apologist Bright Matonga was then the boss at ZUPCO. This is the same patronage system that has seem Mcdee hand-picking Mfundo Mlilo to work in an obscure post at the Coalition. We hear Mfundo is now Mcdee’s ‘personal assistant these days.

Recommendation- Crisis Coalition should fire Brighton from Crisis. Failure to do that will leave fellows with no option but to physically approach their offices and uproot this thief masquerading as finance officer abusing huge amounts of donor funds.

Trevor Judah Murai

A celebrated ass-licker who once wrote a glowing article in a local weekly newspaper showering praises to his godfather Mcdee. For his efforts Judas Iscariot Murai was handsomely rewarded with a job at SST. Now he is the boy responsible for workshops being held under the banner of female student’s consortiums. What is saddening to note is how he has turned these programs to sex workshops wasting a lot of money at expense of fellows. The boy seems confused in whatever he is doing and one wonders how he is given greater tasks than what his mind can achieve.

Recommendation- Despite he together with Masimba Kuchera being the only two people with degrees at SST, Dare recommends that Trevor be dismissed for his lack of understanding of the role of the Trust.

The SST Board

Dare noted that the SST BOARD of Trustees were serving no purpose to the organisation as  most of them don’t even understand what a fellow is. We have had countless fellows’ consultative meetings and never at any occasion have we seen any of these guys. Masimba has deliberately ensured that only he and Mcdee are responsible for appointing who they deem as friendly to them to be part of the Board. Clearly this is a digression from how the first Board of the SST was constituted.

As fellows we have people whom we are comfortable with to be in the board and the current board members should be applauded for promoting mismanagement, corruption and looting in the SST. As fellows we all know competent comrades who have been friends of the struggle, themselves having been born of the struggle for education and academic freedoms in Zimbabwe. And this bunch of people who now call themselves the SST Board should resign from their posts in shame.

None of them have added positive value to the organization and their ‘laissez-faire’ attitude towards the organization has culminated in all these problems of abuse of funds that we see at the SST. In actual fact and as far as we know and can prove, they all seem to have been a part of it. A majority of these board members were handpicked by Mcdonald without the knowledge of the owners (fellows) of the organisation.  In the SST Board sit Matilda Moyo, Sizani Weza, Itai Zimunya, Jacob Mafume and Mcdee himself as part of the same board.

Sizani Weza

Dare recommended that Weza be relieved of his duties as Board Treasurer for bringing the image of the organisation into disrepute because of his leg for a job policy.  We also believe that the US Public Affairs employee defrauded huge sums of money from the organisation together with Masimba through their protégé Marlene Mutsara whom they fraudulently appointed the SST finance officer. Weza’s accounts must be investigated because we believe he looted SST funds with the allowance of and in connivance with Nyamanhindi.

At the US Public Affairs Department while employing his a leg for a job policy, Weza has managed to dupe a majority of young innocent desperate girls into them believing that he can organise scholarships at American Universities and in most instances he would ask for sexual favours. Dare also urges the US Public Affairs Department to caution their employee lest their reputation will be dragged into the mud.

ZINASU

We all know what happened at St Lucia Park, when SST employees namely Simba Moyo, Nyamanhindi and Madzonga convened a bogus meeting between the Mugwadi and Chinyere executives under the guise of brokering unity to the two warring factions.  We are quite aware how Madzonga was sent by Nyamanhindi and Mcdee to buy these boys beer the night prior to the meeting, driving around bars all over town and soliciting for prostitutes.

The truth of the matter is that SST had been promised funds once unity was achieved between the so-called factions. This is the reason why they managed to bribe some leaders of both formations to opt for the perpetually drunk Masaraure (also an MSU student) as the ideal candidate to lead the ‘united formation.’ This they did mindful of the fact that it would now be easier to manipulate their own (Masaraure) and manage ZINASU funds.  Now we hear that the promised $10 000 grant has vanished in a short space of time due to Masaraure’s negligence. icho!

Dare is a group of revolutionaries who stand for the truth and remain committed to the struggle for democracy.

We are found at Number 45 Kilmanock  Close, Belvedere

+263 (4) 4576589, Cell 0776309198

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