Prisons boss fired for insulting Mugabe sister
By Pindai Dube
BULAWAYO – A Zimbabwe Prison Service (ZPS) senior official was this week fired for calling President Robert Mugabe’s late sister Sabina, a woman of loose morals, according to a ZPS charge sheet. Sabina passed away last year in July and was buried at the National Heroes Acre.
Chief Superintendent Joel Judah Ndlovu a top official at Khami Remand Prison was fired from work on Tuesday after appearing before a ZPS disciplinary internal court hearing at Mhlahlandlela government complex in Bulawayo.
According to a ZPS internal disciplinary hearing, allegations against Ndlovu are that “on 31 July last year, while he was watching Sabina’s burial at Heroes Acre on TV with some junior prison officers at Khami Prison officers’ mess and was drunk.
He is alleged to have said Sabina did not deserve to be buried at the Heroes Acre because she was a woman of loose morals”. One of his subordinates then reported the matter to his colleagues at Khami Prison Complex who forwarded the matter to ZPS Bulawayo regional headquarters.
An investigation was later conducted and Ndlovu was brought Prisons boss fired over Sabina insult before a ZPS internal court and was finally fired on Tuesday. Since last year, he has been attending disciplinary hearings.
The expulsion of Ndlovu comes barely two weeks after a police inspector Tedious Chisango of Ntabazinduna police training depot was fired and summarily thrown out of his government house after he was allegedly caught with MDC songs on his mobile phone and computer.
Sabina who was 10 years junior to Mugabe, served as a Member of Parliament (MP) for Makonde East in 1985 and later became the legislator for Zvimba South constituency between 1990 and 2008.
She was also a member of the Zanu (PF) women’s league serving as its national secretary for production and labour. She died at Harare’s Avenues Clinic on July 29 where she had been admitted complaining of stomach pains.
When contacted for comment yesterday, ZPS national spokesperson Priscilla Mthembo could neither deny nor confirm the development. “Our official position is that he retired,” she said.
Bulawayo-based human rights lawyer, Matshobana Ncube condemned the expulsion of Ndlovu saying he had a right to express his personal opinions.
“Ndlovu has a right to make personal comments that have nothing to do with his work or work station because the constitution of Zimbabwe does allow each and everyone of us to hold views of our own that are covered under freedom of expression,” said Ncube.
Zimbabwe Lawyers for Human Rights (ZLHR) last week said it was worried by the rate at which state security agencies are harassing or arresting citizens on charges of insulting Mugabe and his extended family. The organisation says it is regularly receiving cases of such nature.
On Monday, a white commercial farmer and miner Mike Van Royen was arrested and appeared in Bulawayo magistrate courts on charges of insulting President Mugabe. Last month, police arrested the Minister of State in the Prime Minister’s Office Jameson Timba for calling Mugabe “a liar”.
A Chipinge man Gift Mafuka was jailed for 12 months last year for insulting Mugabe. Judging by the number of arrests that have been made related to allegedly insulting Mugabe, the 87-year-old remains one of the most protected man by the country’s laws. Daily News
