Exiled former Cabinet minister, Professor Jonathan Moyo has said Nelson Chamisa who leads the opposition Citizens’ Coalition for Change (CCC) faces defiance over US$40 000 loans extended to his Members of Parliament (MPs).
Chamisa has insisted his party’s lawmakers wronged by accepting the Parliament loans and must face punishment, according to NewZimbabwe.com.
Parliament offered US$40 000 housing loan to each sitting member, US$500 000 for individual ministers and US$350 000 for their deputies.
The loans totalled US$14 million.
Chamisa, a former Minister of ICT, Postal and Courier Services during the Government of National Unity (GNU), views the facilities as bribes to support the ruling ZANU PF. He said in a video clip circulating on social media:
It is so much about Mr Mnangagwa trying to avert a ‘Bhora Musango’ (protest vote) within Zanu PF because he feels that the MPs are going to vote for themselves and campaign for mukomana (Chamisa) and to avert that, they have had to try and oil the palms of the MPs.
They could not do it for Zanu PF only, they also had to do it for CCC, but the CCC were not supposed to drink from this poison chalice. They have joined the pioneer column, they have joined the grave train and they have crossed the line.
I have told them that if you do not act accordingly, you know what it means, the citizens are waiting for you, and they are going to punish you and punish you happily.
So that one is already catered for, I do not agree, encourage or support it. I do not believe that people must be talking about their welfare when the nation is struggling the way we are struggling.
To call it a loan is to be very nice; this is a bribe disguised as a loan, a donkey is a donkey, you cannot call a lion a cat.
But Moyo criticised Chamisa for attempting to whip his MPs into line arguing he faces resistance just like what happened when he lobbied for mass resignations over recalls by MDC. He said in a Twitter post:
ln 2020 they defied him when he wanted them to resign en masse to protest the recalls of MDC-A MPs by @DMwonzora; and in 2022 they have defied him over his afterthought against their taking USD40K Parly loans; so, with his MPs as his only official “structure”, whom does he lead?
The loans triggered a public outroar with members of the public saying the money should have been used to resuscitate the health sector which collapsed about two decades ago.
Some said the timing is off considering that MPs’ terms are coming to an end soon and some might not be able to pay back when they are not voted back into office.
Allan Norman Markham is the only CCC MP who rejected the loan.