×
NewsDay

AMH is an independent media house free from political ties or outside influence. We have four newspapers: The Zimbabwe Independent, a business weekly published every Friday, The Standard, a weekly published every Sunday, and Southern and NewsDay, our daily newspapers. Each has an online edition.

Mnangagwa fires loudmouth Mutodi

Slider
Like probably everybody else, President Emmerson Mnangagwa has probably had enough of Deputy Information minister Energy Mutodi and has decided to fire him.

Like probably everybody else, President Emmerson Mnangagwa has probably had enough of Deputy Information minister Energy Mutodi and has decided to fire him.

By Staff Reporter

In a statement late Wednesday, Regis Chikowore, the permanent secretary for presidential communications, announced Mutodi’s axing, which is with immediate effect.

It is not clear what eventually broke the camel’s back, but Mutodi, prone to outlandish claims, claimed that Information minister, Monica Mutsvangwa and her husband, Christopher, had captured the Information ministry and were using it to fight him .

He was also at loggerheads with Foreign Affairs minister Sibusiso Moyo, following Mutodi’s attack on Tanzania President John Magufuli’s handling of the coronavirus outbreak in that country.

Mutodi was censured publicly, but retorted that his life was in danger, with Moyo and Christopher being the main culprits threatening his life.

Mutodi has in the past had a knack for bizarre claims, clashing several times with Mutsvangwa and Nick Mangwana, the permanent secretary in the Information ministry.

He has also clashed with Alpha Media Holdings, the publishers of NewsDay, the Zimbabwe Independent and the Standard.

But before now, Mnangagwa has been hesitant to pull the trigger on one of the people who supported him publicly when he was Vice President, culminating in the “I’m the boss” mug saga.

Before his unceremonious exit, Mutodi took to Twitter for one of his most eccentric tweets ever.

“Details emerge MDC youths Joana Mamombe, Netsai Marova and Cecilia Chimbiri went out for a romantic night to Bindura with their lovers who are artisanal miners. 

“They parked their car at a police station for safety but tragedy struck when they demanded foreign currency for services,” he tweeted.

Mamombe, Marova and Chimbiri were allegedly abducted by state agents and tortured after a demonstration in Harare.

The government claims the activists faked the abduction.

It is unlikely that Mnangagwa fired Mutodi over that tweet, as moments earlier, the President accused the demonstrators of political grandstanding.

Mutodi was always an unlikely pick for a ministerial position, but Mnangagwa stuck with him as deputy minister for almost two years in spite of his eccentricity

Mutodi has also stoked ethnic tensions by claiming the Ndebele were refugees and foreigners in Zimbabwe.

‘DPC drives banks stability’
By The NewsDay Aug. 30, 2022
Mbare, home of dancehall
By The NewsDay Aug. 30, 2022
Govt stripping assets: MPs
By The NewsDay Aug. 30, 2022
HCC employees in US$41 000 theft
By The NewsDay Aug. 29, 2022