Zimbabweans fume as vice-president runs up huge hotel bill amid cash crunch
Mphoko has spent nearly 600 nights in presidential suite of country’s most luxurious hotel
The country’s ATMs have run out of cash. Even the police and the army — lynchpins of the government’s control — are not getting paid on time.
But as economic protests have multiplied and shut down the capital recently, Vice-President Phelekezela Mphoko has enjoyed a special privilege, courtesy of the state: nearly 600 nights in the presidential suite of Zimbabwe’s most luxurious hotel while his official mansion is being prepared.
The vice-president’s extended stay in the Rainbow Towers presidential suite — he checked into the hotel in December 2014, at a taxpayer cost of $1,000 (Dh3,670) a night, has drawn regular demonstrations outside the five-star landmark, where visiting dignitaries stay.
Refusal to move out
But Mphoko and his wife, Laurinda, would not move out, local news reports said, because they kept rejecting official residences as inadequate, too small or too close to the homes of other government ministers.
“This hotel is going to break,” Sten Zvorwadza warned last month as he and other demonstrators took over the lobby, threatening to shut down the hotel unless Mphoko checked out.
“Gentlemen, gentlemen!” Zvorwadza continued as police surrounded him, lifting him in the air and then dragging him across the marble floor.
Now, after hundreds of thousands of dollars in hotel bills, Mphoko’s stay could finally be coming to an end.
A local newspaper has reported that Mphoko is moving to a $2 million mansion in a neighbourhood called Highlands. Residents there said that they, too, had heard of the vice-president’s impending arrival.
Mphoko has not commented on his plans.
Protesters hold firm
“If he’s leaving the hotel, the country needs to know,” said Zvorwadza, the leader of the protesters who have held demonstrations outside the hotel since last December. “This is the syndrome we are fighting. A public figure must be accountable to his citizens.”
The unconfirmed move — a similar report said that Mphoko was bound for a $4 million mansion late last year — could bring some relief to the government of President Robert Mugabe, who is facing an unusually broad challenge to a crumbling economy.