Mugabe corruption grandmaster, Biti

via Mugabe corruption grandmaster, Biti – NewZimbabwe 29 January 2015

PRESIDENT Robert Mugabe is at the centre of Zimbabwe’s rampaging corruption crisis and cannot be honoured for fighting the economic scourge, opposition politician Tendai Biti has said.

He was responding to reports that a little known shadowy non-governmental organisation, “Zero Tolerance on Corruption” in Zimbabwe was set to honour Mugabe with an award for his fight against graft.

“It will be absurd for anyone to think that Mugabe can be recognised for fighting corruption when he has been then grandmaster of corruption itself.

“This country is anchored on patronage by neo-patrimonialism which is a system of corruption centred on the president on which the country becomes hostage to the President’s boys who grabbed land and companies in the name of the president,” Biti said.

He said Mugabe had failed to prosecute even one parastatal chief executive officer fingered in the Salary-gate scandal despite overwhelming evidence of pillaging of national resources.

“Zimbabwe has been personalized, the state has been hijacked and personalized around the president, and his boys destroyed people’s lives,” said Biti.

“We were treated to a side-show of state newspapers reportedly exposing corruption and the government was at that time frothing at the mouth threatening all manner of fury.

“Now for anyone to suggest that Mugabe could be honoured for fighting corruption eludes our wisdom, when one year on there has not been a single prosecution. It would be a joke with no humour at all.”

Zimbabwe has been ranked among the most corrupt countries in the world with the police force among the worst affected institutions in the country.