Chief Zvimba, born Stanley Mhondoro, Thursday said he has nothing to do with the plot to summon former First Lady Grace Mugabe to a traditional court to force the exhumation of the late former President Robert Mugabe’s remains.
The summons was issued by the officer-in-charge Borrowdale Police Station, a chief inspector, an inspector, an assistant inspector, a messenger from Chief Zvimba’s court identified as Elvis Hundere and Jeremiah Moyo, from the President’s Office.
But speaking to NewsDay yesterday, Chief Zvimba distanced himself from the summons. He said:
I know nothing about this issue (summons). I am hearing it only from inquiries coming from here and there. I know absolutely nothing about that.
I have not seen anything and I have nothing to say about that because I am in the dark. I am not aware of anything.
The summons was inviting Grace to Chief Zvimba’s traditional court to answer to charges of “improperly” burying Mugabe at his Kutama homestead in September 2019.
The government wanted Mugabe to be buried at the National Heroes Acre and was already in the process of building a mausoleum for him, but the family refused to budge and buried him as per “his wish”.
Mugabe’s exiled nephew Patrick Zhuwao accused Mnangagwa of sponsoring the attempt to have his uncle’s remains exhumed “because he has been looking for a sceptre that he believes has the authority to be the leader of Zimbabwe”.
However, the permanent secretary in the Ministry of Information, Publicity and Broadcasting Services, Nick Mangwana mocked Mugabe for “being buried” with a sceptre. He tweeted yesterday:
Saka kachikule kakaita zvetsvimbo, tsvimbo yaiva useless paeconomy (so this old man was using a sceptre which failed to solve the country’s economic woes).