GOKWE-NEMBUDZIYA MP Justice Mayor Wadyajena (Zanu PF) on Thursday reportedly pulled down First Lady Grace Mugabe’s stickers from his BMW sport utility vehicle in protest over the brutal attack of war veterans by police in Harare, NewsDay has learnt.
by Everson Mushava
Fellow MPs, who declined to be named, said Wadyajena removed the stickers at Parliament Building just before the afternoon sitting, as a show of anger towards Grace after war veterans were violently dispersed and teargassed by the police for “gathering illegally”.
They claimed that the outspoken MP insisted he was free to do what he wanted with his car when some legislators asked him why he chose to do it in public.
“He went to his car in anger and started pulling off Grace’s stickers from his car, saying she was behind the police brutality on war vets,” one MP said.
“We saw him remove the stickers from his car that was parked on the third row from the entrance of Parliament’s parking lot. He threw the stickers in a rubbish bin by Parliament Building entrance.
“When he entered the House, other MPs, who saw him, asked why he decided to do that in public, and he told them that it was his car and was free to do whatever he wanted with it because no one bought it for him.”
Contacted for comment, Wadyajena said: “It’s now a broken record invoking the name of our dear mother the First Lady. No amount of tomfoolery will justify such shameless fabrications. I’m sorry there is no story there.”
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However, Nkayi South MP for Abednico Bhebhe (MDC-T) said: “When I saw the car last Thursday, it no longer had stickers, but two weeks ago, it had them. I asked him why he removed them, he just laughed.”
The Gokwe-Nembudziya MP was among the first Zanu PF supporters to have Grace’s stickers on his vehicles when the First Lady was leading a campaign that culminated in the ouster of former Vice-President Joice Mujuru.
However, continued factional fighting has resulted in an allegedly sour relationship between the two, as Wadyajena allegedly belongs to the Lacoste faction, reportedly led by Vice-President Emmerson Mnangagwa, that is battling with the G40 faction, which reportedly has Grace in its ranks in the race to succeed Mugabe.
Wadyajena has a pending court case where he is accused of insulting Grace at a Zanu PF conference in Victoria Falls in December.
