Tagwirei fails to sponsor Arundel Hospital, blames sanctions

Arundel Hospital is reportedly failing to pay health workers claiming that its principal sponsor Sakunda Holdings owned by businessman Kudakwashe Tagwirei is being crunched by sanctions.

In a circulating audio, initially shared by award-winning journalist Hopewell Chin’ono, Arundel Hospital’s head clinician, Dr David Chimuka confirmed that August salaries had not been paid saying plans were afoot to cover them.

“Our Financial Manager has promised that tomorrow everybody will be paid their August salaries at 2pm at Parirenyatwa. All those who worked in August will be paid tomorrow at Parirenyatwa.

“I will try to get the list of the people who will be paid tomorrow and then you can proceed to Parirenyatwa and you will be paid. In the morning, they will be packing the money and they will pay you at 2pm tomorrow,” Dr Chimuka said.

“The September money has not yet been agreed on. So really it’s quite a lot of financial strain as you remember our principal was put on sanctions and therefore money has not been flowing in as usual because of the sanctions which were imposed on our donor principal.”

Tagwirei was recently slapped with sanctions by the United States Department of the Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (Ofac) for supporting President Emmerson Mnangagwa’s administration tainted by human rights abuses and corruption.

Last year, government audit reports prompted by a 2019 parliamentary inquiry, revealed government failed to account for $US3 billion disbursed under the Command Agriculture programme, a state farm subsidy championed by Mnangagwa and largely financed by Sakunda Holdings where Tagwirei as the CEO was responsible for the overall strategy and direction of the company, as well as developing and maintaining relationships with regulators and clients.

A recent report by Organised Crime and Corruption Reporting Project revealed that Tagwirei, after being sanctioned for corruption, continued to do business by relocating his network to Mauritius.

Through his company Fossil Group, Tagwirei is reportedly receiving millions of dollars from the Zanu PF government for road construction contracts, while one of his many companies, Landela Investments, is believed to have received US$110 million from the government to import buses for the state run Zimbabwe United Passenger Company (ZUPCO).

Tagwirei has since combined his mining assets with the government to form an opaque company called Kuvimba Mining. Nehanda Radio