Govt, UN take ozone protection campaign to schools ‘Govt, party should pull in one direction’

GOVERNMENT, in collaboration with the United Nations Environmental experts, has distributed almost 1 000 ozone protection information packages to schools to raise awareness on ozone layer protection which has become a threat to humanity.

The packages were availed by the Ministry of Lands, Agriculture, Water, Climate and Rural Resettlement and distributed to schools through the Ministry of Primary and Secondary Education.

The ministry’s deputy director for Climate Change Department, Mr Kudzai Ndidzano, said the involvement of teachers and school children helped the country in raising awareness on ozone protection and climate change management issues.

“The ministry has adopted a policy to increase awareness among school children on ozone and environmental protection which are a threat to humanity. Competitions in schools in collaboration with the Ministry of Primary and Secondary Education has helped us to raise the level of awareness on ozone protection and climate change management issues among school pupils and their teachers,” he said.

Mr Ndidzano said the department had adopted a training programme for refrigeration technicians meant to equip them with knowledge and skills necessary to avert increased emission of ozone depleting substances. He said the aim was to protect the ozone layer by phasing out the production of numerous substances believed to be responsible for ozone depletion.

“The ministry has already embarked on the enabling activities of the HFC phase down in the refrigeration and air conditioning sector.

“The Department of Climate Change has the trained refrigeration and air conditioning technicians to work safely. The department has conducted four training workshops this year across the country and more than 120 refrigeration air conditioning technicians were trained.

“This has enable our refrigeration and air conditioning technicians to be equipped with skills to work safely with ozone and climate friendly HC refrigerants which are flammable if safety measures are to be followed,” Mr Ndidzano has said.

HFCs are a group of industrial chemicals primarily used for cooling and refrigeration and were developed to replace stratospheric ozone-depleting substances that are currently being phased out under the Montreal Protocol on Substances that Deplete the Ozone Layer. ZANU-PF national commissar Cde Victor Matemadanda has said the party and Government should pull in one direction to deliver on the revolutionary party’s election promises.

He was speaking during the Zanu-PF Midlands Provincial Coordinating Committee meeting at the Winery Convention Centre in Gweru on Saturday.

Cde Matemadanda said Zanu-PF must fight nepotism to unite people in all its structures.

“We won an election using promises that we made in the Zanu-PF manifesto and we must deliver on those promises.

“We can’t have a party going in one direction and Government business the other. This should serve as a warning. If you are in a board and the President approved your appointment, you need to toe the line.

“We will not shy away from this mandate we got from the people. Democracy should recognise the wishes of the majority.”

Cde Matemadanda also spoke on the decision to bury the late ex-President Robert Mugabe at his rural home in Zvimba after the family had initially agreed that he should be buried at the National Heroes Acre.

“When he was alive, Mugabe refused to honour the wishes of the dead saying they cannot decide where they are buried. Now what has changed?

“(Joshua) Nkomo, Benjamin Burombo e.t.c are all buried at Heroes Acre.

“Now we have a coffin being opened morning, afternoon and evening like a fridge. Julius Malema (EFF leader) came and it was opened,” he said.

“Malema, an ANC reject, once said Mugabe was too old and today he is sent by G40.”

Cde Matemadanda said the late former President has no influence on the direction of the country.

“Bob is dead and that’s it. Those who think that the governance of the country has to do with the dead, they must go to the graveyard,” said Cde Matemadanda.

He said Zanu-PF has been winning council and Parliamentary by-elections which shows that people have confidence in President Mnangagwa’s leadership.

He said there are individuals who want to be bigger than the party.

“Councillors, how did you get more votes than the MPs? MPs give us your strategy, how did you become more popular than the party and the President.

“There should be consistency. There should be unity of purpose. We must all pull in the same direction as we go towards 2023,” Cde Matemadanda said.

“We need to identify our own cadres, our own people who have the party at heart because we can’t afford to have people who use money to destroy the party. Put that money into the party.

“We need that addressed. We need to do away with indiscipline.”

He said Zanu-PF has an ideology and structures, and people should shun regionalism, nepotism and corruption in assuming positions.

“Now we have some saying Harare is ours, Manicaland is ours. That must stop. We want representation by a party member anywhere in the country.

“We must do away with nepotism, we must do away with tribalism,” said Cde Matemadanda.