Calls for disclosure of Mugabe's exit deal
Publish date: 04 December 2017
Issue Number: 754
Diary: IBA Legalbrief Africa
Category: Zimbabwe
The opposition National People's Party (NPP) is calling for President Emmerson Mnangagwa to make former President Robert Mugabe's exit package and negotiation deal public. As previously reported in Legalbrief Today, Mugabe and the military held closed-door negotiations which resulted in his resignation last month. However, New Zimbabwe reports that the contents of the negotiations and the deal to which the parties agreed have not been made public. NPP secretary-general Gift Nyandoro has called for the details to be 'immediately' released. 'If the news that Mugabe was offered a $10m lump sum payment, full salary, medical cover, security as well as protection of his private properties as part of the deal that led to his resignation are true, then Zimbabwe is doomed,' Nyandoro is quoted in the report as saying.
The opposition MDC has called for a holistic approach to fighting graft after the government issued a three-month moratorium for the recovery of funds siphoned from its coffers. A report on the News24 site notes that Mnangagwa last week announced a 90-day moratorium for the return of funds siphoned out of the country by individuals and corporations during Mugabe's reign. Mnangagwa said that those who returned their illegally earned monies were going to be pardoned unconditionally. MDC spokesperson Obert Gutu said graft had become a ‘public secret that, over the years, top politicians and other well–connected individuals illegally externalised huge amounts of money’.
Meanwhile, Mugabe's relatives have reportedly claimed that they cut ties with their daughter-in-law Grace Mugabe more than two years ago. Voice of America reports that the Mugabe clan accused Grace of being ‘disrespectful to family elders, showing off and sowing seeds of disharmony within the family’. Legalbrief reports that the former First Lady has been widely blamed for sparking the revolt which led to the ousting of her husband after 37 years in power. Mugabe's uncle Ben Matibiri claimed that Grace belittled relatives ‘as she tried to borrow powers at every opportunity’.
