PRESIDENT of the Chiefs’ Council Chief Fortune Charumbira yesterday castigated politicians for using food to buy votes.
Report by Feluna Nleya Speaking during his acceptance speech after elections retained him as president of the Chiefs’ Council, a position he has held for the past eight years, Charumbira said: “This was a good election; it has shown that chiefs are different from politicians. We did not bribe any chief. We did not kill any beasts for us to be voted for. We were just elected. So I say to politicians do not do fastfood campaigns, do not campaign using mealie-meal and other foodstuffs, what people want is development.”
Chiefs Charumbira and Lucas Mtshane Khumalo were retained as the president and vice-president of the Chiefs’ Council respectively in elections conducted by the Zimbabwe Electoral Commission (Zec) yesterday.
The two automatically become members of the Senate.
The comments by Charumbira come after the two MDC formations on Thursday attacked Zanu PF candidates for buying votes by doling out foodstuffs at campaign rallies. First Lady Grace Mugabe has been dishing out truckloads of foodstuffs — including hundreds of tonnes of maize meal, sugar beans, cooking oil and salt.
Charumbira said their election had shown that the chiefs were united and conducted elections peacefully.
“With this election, we have shown people that we are united, so there should be unity among our people. You chose us to lead you and we will do so, because this country is ours. Our people should not be suffering, they should have better lives. We should have our people’s interests at heart.”
Chief Charumbira of Masvingo was nominated by 34 of the 35 chiefs that make up the council and was declared the president of the council while Chief Khumalo of Bubi was elected by 33 out of the 35 chiefs and declared vice-president.
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Charumbira said: “I thank the chiefs for having faith in me and Khumalo and re-electing us so that we could go ahead with the work we started. We thank Zec for the wonderful organisation of the election.”
