Jacob Mafume has always been a walking mistake — a man whose political career has survived only because Zimbabwe has a limitless tolerance for mediocrity dressed as brilliance.
I knew Mafume at the University of Zimbabwe almost three decades ago. He has not grown up, and he has certainly not grown into the office he occupies. If anything, he has simply refined his old tricks, polished his insecurities, and expanded his appetite for political relevance.
During his years at Crisis Coalition, Mafume strutted around with the arrogance of a man who believed close proximity to the US Embassy was a licence to bully, intimidate, and manufacture fear.
My long-time colleague from our UZ days still tells the story of Mafume threatening a fellow patron in a pub: “Don’t underestimate me. I will get your name added to the sanctions list.”
That was Jacob then — insecure, overinflated, and pretending to wield power he did not have.
And Jacob today?
The same, only with better suits and a mayoral chain he has no idea how to honour.
THE UNIVERSITY TRICKS THAT NEVER LEFT HIM
Mafume and his close ally Wilson Munemero were notorious in student politics for concocting scandals against fellow activists. Before Photoshop existed, they mastered the dark arts of manipulation.
They forged CIO letterheads accusing rivals of being spies. They produced fake images — crudely pieced together with photocopiers — portraying fellow student leaders like Learnmore Jongwe in compromising positions.
These were not political strategists. They were schemers. Children playing with matches in a petrol shed.
And some habits do not die.
I am reliably informed the “Avenues escapades” that preoccupied him in the 1990s did not exactly evaporate with age or responsibility. But this, as they say, is besides the point — a footnote in a long biography of a man unable to separate public office from personal thrill.
What matters today is not Mafume’s student scandals, nor the dreaded SRA misappropriation saga that shadowed him at UZ.
What matters is the dangerous political mutation he has undergone as Mayor of Harare.
He is no longer just a nuisance.
He is now a willing, celebrated, and fully co-opted participant in ZANU PF’s patronage machine.
THE CCC MAYOR WHO WORKS FOR ZANU PF
On paper, Jacob Mafume is a CCC Mayor.
In practice, he is ZANU PF’s most useful urban agent after Big Wicknell Chivayo.
He has become Mnangagwa’s favourite mascot in local governance — pliable, obedient, and always ready to say the absurd with the confidence of a man reading gospel truth.
And he finally outdid himself this week.
Addressing a gathering, Mafume declared:
“Water, according to our constitution, belongs to His Excellency President Mnangagwa. It is administered by central government. We are only conveyors.”
This was not a slip of the tongue.
It was not a misreading of the constitution.
It was not even one of those careless political metaphors.
It was treachery — delivered by a man trained in law, entrusted with public office, and expected to know better.
THE CONSTITUTION SAYS THE OPPOSITE
Let us start with the basic facts that Mafume, the lawyer, pretended not to know:
Section 77(a): Every Zimbabwean has the right to safe, clean, potable water.
Section 73: Environmental rights and protection, including water resources.
Nowhere — absolutely nowhere — does the Constitution declare that water “belongs” to the President.
Zimbabwe’s natural resources do not convert into personal property with every election cycle.
Water is a national resource, not a presidential gift.
Zimbabweans do not drink at the benevolence of Mnangagwa or any other office bearer.
Rights are not presidential favours.
Water is not a ZANU PF goody bag.
And yet here was Harare’s Mayor — the man tasked with managing the capital’s collapsing water infrastructure — kneeling before the President and offering him ownership of an entire nation’s hydrology.
This was not ignorance.
It was political servitude.
WHY WOULD A MAYOR SAY THIS?
The answer is depressingly simple:
Mafume has become a cog — small but essential — in ZANU PF’s urban control project.
Harare’s water crisis is not an accident. It is not simply a result of broken pipes and old pumps. It is a tool — a convenient narrative that allows central government to blame opposition-run councils and justify interference, takeovers, and “joint operations” that always end with ZANU PF-aligned companies controlling lucrative service contracts.
Mafume, instead of defending the city he is elected to serve, has become the chief courier of ZANU PF’s talking points.
He tells citizens that the President owns the water.
He tells residents the best they can be is “conveyors.”
He tells the government what it wants to hear, not what the constitution requires him to say.
THIS IS NO LONGER COWARDICE — IT IS COLLABORATION
A CCC Mayor standing boldly to surrender constitutional powers to the President is not being pragmatic. He is not being diplomatic. He is not avoiding conflict.
He is collaborating.
Harare has seen many mayors, good and bad.
But none have volunteered the city’s rights to the ruling party with the eagerness of Jacob Mafume.
He is not compromised by accident.
He is not misguided.
He is co-opted by design.
A man who started his political life forging letters and faking scandals has simply graduated into forging constitutional interpretations and fabricating legal justifications for executive overreach.
THE DANGER OF MEN LIKE MAFUME
Zimbabwe’s biggest threat is not always the men at the top of the patronage pyramid.
It is the useful volunteers who operate in the cracks — polishing authoritarianism with democratic vocabulary.
Men like Mafume.
Men who enter councils with the language of change and leave office speaking like provincial governors.
Men who treat rights as favours, laws as suggestions, and constitutions as menu options for political appeasement.
When a mayor tells citizens that their water belongs to the President, he is not misreading the law.
He is rewriting the relationship between citizens and the state — turning rights into privileges, and privileges into presidential possessions.
JACOB MAFUME MUST BE HELD ACCOUNTABLE
Harare deserves better.
The opposition deserves better.
Zimbabwe deserves leaders who understand that public office is a trust — not a stepping stone to proximity, patronage, or presidential favour.
Mafume’s statement was not a mistake.
It was an ideological declaration.
He has chosen his side — and it is not the side of the people he is elected to serve.
Jacob Mafume is not merely misguided.
He is not simply reckless.
He is not confused.
He is co-opted. Willingly. Eagerly. Fully.
And Zimbabwe must call him out for it.
