Vice-President Emmerson Mnangagwa yesterday said government has no plans to tax churches except for the business ventures they run on a commercial basis.
BY VENERANDA LANGA
The VP was responding in the National Assembly to a question by Bikita West MP Munyaradzi Kereke (Zanu PF) who wanted him to explain if government was “planning to tax prayers”.
“I do not know exactly what Zimra commissioner-general Gershem Pasi said,” Mnangagwa responded.
“We are not going to tax prayers, but every business should pay taxes — it does not matter if it is run by churches, but that business will be taxed.
“We are not going to tax tithes and I want to assure churches to keep operating and converting people.”
Meanwhile, MDC legislator Priscilla Misihairabwi-Mushonga alleged during the question and answer session that female MPs were being sexually harassed by their male counterparts.
Misihairabwi-Mushonga asked Mnangagwa to explain where female MPs can report such abuse which mostly stem from how female legislators dressed and looked.
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“There is rampant use of rough language around women’s dressing, and there is so much patriarchal sexual harassment — not exactly in the sense that people are literally having sex,” Misihairabwi-Mushonga said.
Mnangagwa said the MPs should report the cases to the police or use Parliamentary disciplinary channels.
Speaker of the National Assembly Jacob Mudenda urged affected MPs to report the cases to allow for investigations to take place.
In another development, Mudenda ruled that absence of ministers during the question and answer session was unconstitutional and in breach of the newly amended Parliament Standing Rules and Orders.
This was after Kuwadzana East MP Nelson Chamisa and Glen View North MP Fani Munengami (both MDC-T) had raised the issue after noticing there were no ministers in the House to take questions from MPs when the House resumed at 2:15pm, except for Agriculture deputy minister (livestock) Paddy Zhanda.
Twenty minutes later six ministers and three deputies trickled into the House when MPs were already debating a motion on marginalisation of women introduced by Misihairabwi-Mushonga.
