HARARE – President Emmerson Mnangagwa has no original concepts of his own and is now relying on copying from the MDC even when the ideas are not sound, the opposition party’s leader Nelson Chamisa, pictured, has claimed.
Chamisa, who has refused to accept Mnangagwa’s victory in the July 30 elections arguing the presidential poll was rigged, said this at the Morgan Richard Tsvangirai House in Harare as he welcomed dozens of former vice president Joice Mujuru’s National People’s Party members who recently crossed the floor after the party suffered a crushing defeat in the elections.
“I have realised that they shamelessly copy everything that I do. Even if I were to announce that I am going out to rape people, by midnight they will have done that just to outdo me. I saw it when I said I was doing clean-up campaigns, they also did, when I said I am doing thank you rallies and they also did the same under the same nomenclature and even had only one rally after realising that I had had only one,” Chamisa said.
“He (Mnangagwa) is following me everywhere but it is not bad when one copies good things. But we are saying they lack the acumen to come up with original ideas to take this country forward that is why they now want to also embark on a clean-up campaign.
“Even if we say we want to kill people, they will be the first to do that. They will do anything we do no matter how bad it is so we have to make sure we lead in a good way seeing that we are actually leading the country,” he said sarcastically.
This is not the first time that Chamisa has claimed that Mnangagwa and Zanu PF have a proclivity for plagiarism.
In the run-up to the elections Chamisa delayed the MDC Alliance’s election manifesto publication until Zanu PF had published its own ostensibly to avoid the bootlegging of the document.
The notion was, however, dismissed by Zanu PF spokesperson Simon Khaya Moyo describing the allegations as “hogwash”.
Chamisa had told the media that the MDC Alliance had concluded its policy document but would hold on to it “to avoid theft of ideas”.
The document, which formed the basis of the MDC Alliance manifesto, deals with five fundamental issues aimed at jump-starting the national economy, Chamisa said.
“We know our colleagues in Zanu PF are very good at manipulating our policies, they have done so through president (Emmerson) Mnangagwa, who has been literally copying and pasting our policies, not that we are worried if it’s good for the nation,” Chamisa said.
Soon after taking over as president in December last year after the fall of former president Robert Mugabe, Mnangagwa announced his government’s economic direction which immediately unsettled the MDC as officials pointed out that he had cloned some policies from its economic blueprints.
MDC Manicaland spokesperson Trevor Saruwaka was the first to throw a salvo sarcastically suggesting that he was “happy that the new president is stealing our ideas”.
“Our desire as MDC is for Zimbabweans to live well. We have never once refused to advise government to improve the welfare of Zimbabweans.
“Mnangagwa found it fit to start stealing ideas coming from MDC so that it helps the nation and it is something quite commendable and positive,” Saruwaka said.
“What the nation should realise is that the positive they will see are MDC ideas but those things that will be amiss will be Zanu PF.
“But when MDC gets custody of government after the next elections, things will be even much better. Let them try to copy as much as possible to improve the economy,” he said.
