Mutodi eyes Bikita South seat

By Tendai Kamhungira

Outspoken businessman-cum politician Energy Mutodi is eyeing the Bikita South National Assembly seat after the ruling Zanu PF party transferred him from Mashonaland East to Masvingo with effect from June 29.

Mutodi had been censured following disciplinary proceedings against him by the Mashonaland East province on a list of charges including allegations of undermining the party’s 2014 congress resolutions.

The outcome of the disciplinary hearing has not yet been made public.

His transfer has been confirmed through a letter written to the Zanu PF Masvingo provincial leadership by Lawrence Katsiru, the Mashonaland East provincial secretary for administration.

“Mutodi is a strong Zanu PF supporter. He rose through the ranks up to the district secretary for finance, Munenge district in Goromonzi West. However,…Mutodi is transferring from Mashonaland East province to Masvingo province with immediate effect. He is now settling in Masvingo and for that reason, we find his transfer imminent.

“Take note that he was in the provincial basket in the 2015 provincial executive elections held after the Gamatox saga. A situation which was still pending, hope he will find it safe to continue with his hard work for the party,” Katsiru’s letter reads.

Contacted for comment, the businessman said he was happy to have transferred to Masvingo province “so as to help my home area develop”.

“I have done quite some good work in Domboshawa in Goromonzi since the year 2006 and I think it is time for me to do charity work in Bikita where I was born,” Mutodi said.

Mutodi could neither confirm nor deny reports that he was eyeing the Bikita South seat.

The seat is currently occupied by sacked Zanu PF ex-provincial commissar Jappy Jaboon.

Masvingo province is the core of Zanu PF’s factional wars, pitting the Generation 40 (G40) and Vice President Emmerson Mnangagwa’s Team Lacoste.

Mutodi is a self-confessed supporter of Mnangagwa while Jaboon is said to be sympathetic to the G40 which has been at sixes and sevens in Masvingo province ever since it lost control of the region following the re-election of Ezra Chadzamira.

Chadzamira, who had been suspended by Zanu PF under unclear circumstances, twice beat Mutero Masanganise, a reported President Robert Mugabe’s relative and G 40 sympathiser, to retain his chairmanship’s post.

Despite spirited attempts to overturn his victory, Chadzamira was endorsed and congratulated by Mugabe during his youth interface rally in Masvingo on June 30. Daily News