Police officers guarding President Emmerson Mnangagwa’s private residence in the exclusive Hellensville neighbourhood of Harare fired warning shots after suspected thieves broke into the property just after midnight on July 6, reported ZimLive.
The report states that at least three male individuals were seen fleeing the property on Wheeleon Road after the police fired the warning shots.
The sprawling two-story mansion, which is still under construction, is believed to have been targeted by the gang for the construction equipment stored on the premises.
Police recovered an armoured cable and a copper pipe that had been dumped in the yard after the thieves escaped.
The house, which is being built by the Chinese company Zim Nantong Construction, is situated on 25,000 square meters of prime urban land and has eight cluster houses around it at different stages of construction. The project has been ongoing for the past five years.
On Tuesday, 09 July, Zimbabwe Republic Police (ZRP)spokesperson Commissioner Paul Nyathi said they had launched investigations into an alleged break-in at the office of the Deputy Minister of Tourism and Hospitality Industry, Tongai Mafidi Mnangagwa, in Harare.
Commissioner Nyathi said the reported break-in incident occurred between July 5th and July 8th, 2024.
Break-ins involving the Mnangagwa family members are not entirely uncommon, as there have been similar reported incidents at President Mnangagwa’s offices during the height of the ZANU-PF succession battles before the November 2017 military coup.
When Mnangagwa served as the Minister of Justice and later as Vice President, his offices were reportedly broken into on multiple occasions.
However, many of these cases ultimately developed into “cold cases” with no resolution.
Some sceptics have questioned whether these break-in incidents involving the Mnangagwas may have been staged to elicit public sympathy, given the high-security expectations around the premises where they have occurred.
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