Buhera South MP Joseph Chinotimba (Zanu PF) yesterday demanded that the government of Kuwait should be fined for allowing its citizens to enslave over 200 Zimbabwean women trafficked to the Middle East country after being promised lucrative jobs.
BY XOLISANI NCUBE
Raising a point of order in the National Assembly, Chinotimba said Kuwait should be charged a substantial amount of money for exposing Zimbabwean women to “slavery and inhuman treatment” through human trafficking.
“Mr Speaker, I raise a point of order, I wanted to find out if there is anything that can be done by our government to charge the Kuwaiti government for slavery of our girls. I say so because we need them to be held accountable. They must compensate for the slavery our girls were subjected to,” Chinotimba said, amid murmurings of disapproval from the opposition MDC-T legislators.
The legislator added: “These people (MDC-T MPs) are making noise, Mr Speaker, because they don’t understand what I am talking about. These are matters of life and the future of some people. I have read somewhere that Britain was sometime back made to pay by Kenya for such crimes. Can we also not make them (Kuwaiti government) pay for these crimes?” This came as parliamentarians were applauding Speaker of the National Assembly Jacob Mudenda for leading a delegation to Kuwait where they rescued 32 of the estimated 200 Zimbabwean women stranded in the Middle East country.
Meanwhile, the Parliamentary Portfolio Committee on Finance and Economic Development, chaired by David Chapfika, yesterday presented its report on the proposed Special Economic Zones Bill. The committee recommended that companies that will operate under the special economic zones would be exempted from complying with the country’s labour and indigenisation laws.
But this was shot down by opposition MPs who said the provision would expose workers to abuse by their employers.
