The Financial Gazette

Mutsekwa says they’ve no reason to stay in State houses

Clemence Manyukwe, Political Editor

FOUR top judges and senior ZANU-PF officials occupying government houses at Gunhill Villas are being evicted at the high-security complex to make way for new tenants from the bloated coalition, which is battling to find accommodation for several bureaucrats. The evictions are part of the first phase of an initiative by the Ministry of National Housing and Social Amenities of taking stock of government property as well as getting rid of undeserving occupants who are refusing to vacate the State residences.
The ministry has been under intense pressure to serve eviction notices on former government ministers clinging on to houses leased from the State as well as those who are leasing multiple government houses.
Results of an initial audit of government houses in our possession targets for eviction four judges and three former ministers. Those who are required to move out of the Gunhill Villas, home to several top officials, are the Deputy Supreme Court, Chief Justice Luke Malaba, and High Court judges Justice Lavender Makoni, Justice Antonia Guvava and Justice Maphios Cheda.
Masvingo Resident Minister and provincial governor, Titus Malule-ke, and former deputy ministers, Abigail Damasane and Morris Sakabuya, are among the senior politicians at the villas who should vacate the State premises within the next three months.
The four judges, who are entitled to State accommodation are said to be having alternative accommodation, while Damasane, a Matabe-leland South ZANU-PF central committee member, and Sakabuya, who is now the chief executive officer of the ailing Zimbabwe United Passenger Company (ZUPCO), are no longer in government.
Although, Maluleke is still serving government, resident ministers and provincial governors are required to have official accommodation only in their respective provinces, with the top official also facing uncertainty in his current position since the posts of provincial governors expired last month.
The appointment of provincial governors is currently the subject of contestation between the main political actors in the inclusive government.
An official communication in possession of The Financial Gazette from the Minister of National Housing and Social Amenities, Giles Mutsekwa, to his permanent secretary, David Munyoro, directs the latter to draft letters to the affected individuals to find alternative accommodation within three months failure of which they would be evicted.
“The following have no reason to be occupying the villas indicated against their names: a) SI449/427 Hon A. Damasane — she was deputy minister of education sometime. But still does not enjoy these facilities, otherwise we (will) have the entire Parliament knocking at our office doors every day; b) SI449/446 Hon M. Sakabuya — he was deputy minister of local government sometime. He left government and I understand he now works for ZUPCO as chief executive officer,” said Mutsekwa.
“S449/436 Hon Maluleke — he is the sitting provincial governor for Masvingo. Surely, governors have official accommodation in their respective provinces. This governor cannot have it both ways.”
The minister also ordered that three persons occupying villas identified only as L. Ngwenya, G. Marema and P. Mahlaba must be given two weeks to identify themselves and where they work to determine the way forward. 
In another directive, the Housing and Social Amenities Minister requested further information on the persons earmarked to take possession of  six other unoccupied government houses since they were said to be reserved for unidentified persons.
In an interview yesterday, Mutsekwa declined to comment on the latest government housing audit saying it was still an internal and confidential matter that is not yet ripe for public consumption.
“We will issue a statement at the appropriate time,” the minister said.
The deliberate exercise of taking stock of government high-security houses and evicting undeserving occupants, comes at a time the inclusive government is faced with a serious crisis of accommodation that has seen Vice-President John Nkomo and Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai still living at their previous residences in Milton Park and Strathaven in Harare.
The situation is said to have been exacerbated by the reluctance by former ZANU-PF top officials, who lost their positions at the formation of the inclusive government in February last year, to vacate the residences triggering the latest initiative.
More names are expected to come into the open as government spreads its initiative beyond Gunhill Villas to other parts of Harare where former bureaucrats and top ZANU-PF officials are said to be refusing to vacate State houses.
Some ministers from the two formations of the Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) are said to be staying in flats in the Avenues area and hotels, thereby increasing pressure on the fiscus.
Last year, the then Housing Minister, Fidelis Mhashu, who lost his ministerial post when Prime Minister Tsvangirai reshuffled his cabinet in a development that saw Mutsekwa being moved from Home Affairs to the current post, complained that some senior ZANU-PF officials were hiding information pertaining to the state of government houses in order for them to live illegally in these properties.
But in his latest communication to Munyoro, Mutsekwa said the vacating of undeserving individuals from the Gunhill Villas would see others without accommodation, especially ministers, being accommodated.
The minister added that the development would also result in lawful occupants not being subjected to what he said was “unnecessary censorship”.
Although in the correspondence Mutsekwa did not explain the issue of censorship, during a 2004 High Court case in which the State sought the eviction of former information and publicity minister, Jonathan Moyo, from the same villas following his sacking from government, a law officer told the presiding judge in the matter that only those who enjoy the confidence of the State occupy them.
The law officer added that if Moyo or any other person who is not in government, was allowed to occupy the villas, it would “highly endanger the security of the other remaining guests and the security of the State in general”.

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