In a typical African village, any parents would be accused of witchcraft if they remained silent and continued their daily business while strangers and neighbours wail and mourn their dead child.
Similarly, Zimbabwe and all her security and law enforcement agencies have remained silent while South Africa’s Financial intelligence Centre and the United States’ Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) are taking bold, decisive steps regarding the US$40 million of Zimbabwe taxpayers’ money that was stolen by Wicknell Chivayo and his political acolytes under the guise of procuring election materials for the 2023 plebiscite.
Damning revelations emerged last week when South Africa’s Financial Intelligence Unit unearthed that of the R1,1 billion of Zimbabwe taxpayers money paid to South Africa’s Ren Form CC for the elections contract, R800 million, almost two thirds of the total contract cost, was paid back to Chivayo and his acolytes.
This not only pointed to an incestuous connivance between Chivayo and the contractor but it also revealed that the total tender cost was deliberately inflated to abet corruption as only R300 000, or a quarter of the amount paid by the Zimbabwe government, turned out to be the real cost of the elections contract.
The bombshell revelations are contained in an analysis of Ren-Form CC’s bank accounts done by South Africa’s Financial Intelligence Centre (FIC) between April 5, 2023, and May 16, 2024.
The FIC tendered its findings to the Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe’s Financial Intelligence Unit, and also the South African Revenue Services and South African Police Service “for urgent attention and commencement of investigation.”
According to the FIC, Zimbabwe’s finance ministry paid a total of US$61,129,440 (R1, 167 364, 300, 51) to Ren-Form CC’s two bank accounts held with Standard Bank in South Africa.
The Zimbabwe Finance ministry also curiously paid the equivalent of R156 million directly to an account in the name of Edenbreeze, a company owned by Chivayo. The payment was for “architectural, engineering and other technical services.”
The FIC report says Ren-Form CC’s bank accounts were repeatedly flagged for suspicious transactions “due to rapid movement of funds to various parties” once payment was received from Zimbabwe’s treasury.
In June last year, following the leaked audios revealing the blatant looting of the US$40 million in the election tenders scandal, now known as ZEC-gate, Michael Reza, the chairperson of the Zimbabwe Anti-Corruption Commission (ZACC), addressed the press and promised immediate action to arrest the culprits.
Despite his loud noises, I wrote then that this “Reza” was too blunt to cut anything because of Emmerson Mnangagwa’s ominously dark footprints that were all over the whole sordid scandal.
One year later, nothing has been done by the anti-corruption body except arresting the whistleblowers, Mike Chimombe and Moses Mpofu.
Apart from their own separate case to do with a Presidential goat scheme, it is pertinent to state that other countries have policies that protect whistleblowers as an incentive to stem avarice and corruption but in Zimbabwe, it is the whistleblowers that are arrested in order to protect the culprits.
But while the FBI of the United States and the Financial Intelligence Centre of South Africa are making a lot of noise about this huge raid of our national coffers, including exhorting the Zimbabwe government to investigate possible crimes, we, the fleeced Zimbabwean taxpayers and our national security institutions, are loudly quiet.
As a nation, we have collectively become akin to the joyful parents who remained silent, continued their daily business and maintained their charmingly enchanting smile while strangers and neighbours mourned their dead child.
It is the neighbours and strangers that are in mourning and looking more troubled than us, the bereaved parents of an innocent child that is lying still and motionless in the soft requiem of death.
Indeed, as the US and SA security institutions boldly try to get to the root of this huge financial crime that stemmed from Harare, there is silence of the grave by both the prejudiced Zimbabwe taxpayers and all our national security institutions.
As stated earlier, despite sonorous promises last year to take action on this mammoth electoral heist, Michael Reza and his anti-corruption (or is it pro-corruption?) Commission are curiously quiet, especially after the recent stunning revelations By the Financial Intelligence Centre of South Africa.
The police are quiet.
The Joint Operations Command (JOC) is quiet.
The taxpayers are quiet.
The President is quiet.
The Minister of Home Affairs is quiet.
Parliament is quiet. Our esteemed elected MPs are only awaiting their pieces of land on Harare’s wetlands in an overt bribery scheme
The Minister of Justice is quiet, only finding his voice when “bootlickingly” exhorting party structures and the nation to support the unconstitutional extension of the President’s term to 2030.
The Zimbabwe Electoral Commission (ZEC) is quiet.
In fact, ZEC, the body at the centre of the scandal, last week gave an interesting response to the stunning revelations by South Africa’s Financial Intelligence Centre:
“Let’s leave that issue alone,” ZEC deputy chairperson, Rodney Kiwa said as he dodged questions from journalists over the matter.
“Ngatimbosiyana nazvo (let us leave that matter). ZEC is not involved in that. It has nothing to do with us.”
Yet ZEC has everything to do with this matter because the whole saga has to do with elections and election materials.
And ZEC is the sole body constitutionally mandated to deal with all electoral matters.
But perhaps because Kiwa’s boss, Priscilla Makanyara Chigumba, is implicated in the scandal, he refused to comment on the matter to protect his job. But it was not correct for Kiwa to say ZEC has no direct interest in this saga.
Conclusion: Mnangagwa’s dark shadow
One can only conclude that all the security institutions are paralysed and are not pursuing this matter because of Mnangagwa’s looming shadow over this matter.
Remember it was ED’s office, and not ZEC as should have been the case, that selected Ren Form CC as the supplier of election materials while his daughter, Chido, was one of the recipients of the filthy lucre from ZEC-gate through Wicknell “My Son” Chivayo.
What is curious about the revelations by SA’s Financial Intelligence Centre is that though he was a mere intermediary in the elections deal, Chivayo pocketed R800 million, more than double the R300 000 paid to Ren Form CC for the election material.
In our culture, a marrying family chooses and sends an intermediary or a go-between (munyai) to go and negotiate with the bride’s family on their behalf.
Usually, after offering his/ her interlocutory services, the intermediary is paid a token amount.
But Chivayo is like a lobola ceremony go-between whose paid “token” was more than the bride price.
Indeed, the R800 million paid to “munyai”Chivayo against Ren Form CC’s R300 000 is akin to a munyai whose token payment for emissary services was double the lobola price he tendered on behalf of the groom!
As the FBI and SA’s Financial Intelligence Centre grapple with this massive heist amid possible acts of money laundering by Chivayo, the security services in Zimbabwe, the prejudiced country, have curiously maintained the silence of the grave.
As stated earlier, collectively as Zimbabweans, we have become the sorcerous parents that go about their daily business leaving strangers and neighbours to mourn over their dear deceased child.
Two weeks ago, while speaking on an unrelated matter, the motor mouth Zanu PF spokesperson Christopher Mutsvangwa said Mnangagwa had acted decisively to ensure that all entities in the country’s security sector were under what he called ”safe hands”.
Given their stunning silence over this massive heist of taxpayers’ funds while the FBI of the US and South Africa’s FIC are running around over the matter, we now know that what Chris truly meant was that ED,—-in a decisive and deliberate act—had deliberately rung changes to utterly compromise the security sector in Zimbabwe.
Indeed, all the security organs of Zimbabwe are now under “safe hands” that will not dare lift a finger as ED and his sidekicks dip their grubby hands in the national cookie jar!
Luke Tamborinyoka is a citizen from Domboshava. By profession he is a journalist and a political scientist You can interact with him through his Facebook page or via the X handle @ luke_tambo.
