Chiefs should not be Zanu PF lackeys

CHIEFS Council president Fortune Charumbira last month torched a storm after he declared that traditional leaders owned Zanu PF and, therefore, could not be separated from the ruling party by the Constitution.

The utterances are disturbing in the extreme.

Is it because they get Isuzu twin cab vehicles from the government come election time, or is it because they truly believe that they and their subjects are best-served by a Zanu PF government?

If it is because they get pick-up vehicles, they are not only mercenaries who are selling their souls for a few pieces of silver, but also selling themselves short.

Their station in society deserves a whole lot more than a pick-up vehicle once every five or 10 years. They should be earning a decent salary, not the pennies that the Zanu PF-led government gives them and also should not live in unpainted one-roomed brick houses that Zanu PF thinks are suitable accommodation for them.

Their support for Zanu PF over the years is directly responsible for the poverty that they and their subjects have been living in since 2000 — a whole generation has known nothing but poverty.

The chiefs seem to want Zanu PF to carry on so that they can drive the pick-up vehicles for a year, before they break down on the terrible roads in the rural areas.

The roads are bad because the chiefs have forced people to vote for Zanu PF all these years. After 41 years of independence, roads in rural areas should by now be tarred, if the government had any interest in the welfare of the rural electorate.

Instead of being Zanu PF lackeys, chiefs should be serving their subjects and not just Zanu PF supporters who are in their midst. How can Zanu PF members, let alone city dwellers, have any respect for chiefs, whose only desire in life is to own a car?

Any future government should look seriously into the chiefs’ welfare and give them adequate remuneration and the necessary facilities to properly administer their areas. But how will any new government justify supporting chiefs that are beholden to a particular party?

These chiefs need to be removed and replaced with individuals who represent all their subjects and administer their areas without fear or favour. The same applies to all other traditional leaders. CHIEF CHIDUKU