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Temba Mliswa

Zanu-PF Mashonaland West provincial chairman Cde Temba Mliswa is a combative politician and businessman who has done well for his age.
However, he has shown in recent days that he is a man of questionable moral and business standing as well. Also, he seems to be possessed by a dangerous tendency of getting carried away.

Many got to know him during his rugby-playing and coaching days, up to the stage he fell out with the gurus in that sporting discipline over racism. He fought a good fight indeed for everyone in that respect. He gained more prominence when he went into agriculture and other businesses, justly taking advantage of the land reform and indigenisation and economic empowerment programmes. He got into politics over the past few years in Mashonaland West, sealing his ascendancy by being elected provincial chair of Zanu-PF and Hurungwe West MP last July.

He has used his presence in Parliament to talk tough against corruption, including almost naming a minister whom he accused of having used looted funds to buy a financial institution.

Cde Mliswa is now caught up in his own scandal, raising serious questions over his own integrity as a national politician and crusader against corruption and bad governance. He has been sensationally exposed as having demanded $165 million or 10 percent shares from wealthy businessman, Conrad Rautenbach, for his purported role in facilitating the billionaire’s investment at Hwange, Unki Platinum Mine and Chisumbanje ethanol plant.

In all the three investments, Cde Mliswa admits he has no written agreements with Rautenbach but wants us to believe that they were serious, above-board business deals.

What entitles him to 10 percent shares in the three investments apart from corruption?
“I do not come cheap,” he boasted on Tuesday. “I am not one of those who get satisfied about being given a brown envelope and go. I want a stake in the business, especially if it is a lucrative business.”

We have to say this; contrary to his self-serving characterisation, Cde Mliswa is only an expensive extortionist. Also, he cheapened himself when he entered into verbal agreements when acceptable, serious business demands signed agreements.  Only a cheap person is so desperate that he is quick to agree to unwritten agreements, knowing that insisting on formal ones would collapse the deals and with it, the prospect of payment. Cheap persons resort to blackmail to extract money that they are not legally entitled to.

We noted earlier Cde Mliswa’s supposedly strong views against corruption, but he has to answer questions on how he secured the right to farm at Chisumbanje when, by his own admission, he did not have any money to fully utilise that estate, resulting in him approaching Rautenbach for the real investment while he settled for mere facilitation and consultation fees. Did he not secure the rights corruptly?

How different is his approach from that of a “tenderpreneur” who lies into winning a tender when he lacks the wherewithal to satisfy the requirements of that tender?

It is surprising how he thinks he was entitled to 10 percent of the three coal, ethanol and platinum businesses when he did not own anything related to them in the first place. He does not own the Chisumbanje estate; Arda does. He was not the legal owner of the platinum reserve at Unki, or the coal at Hwange. How, then does he think he deserved the $165 million?

Without providing any evidence, like he does making multi-million dollar claims basing on verbal agreements, Cde Mliswa is recklessly accusing everyone of bad things. He accuses Minister of Information, Media and Broadcasting Services, Professor Jonathan Moyo of belonging to a “faction” in Zanu-PF and allegedly using the public media to attack perceived rivals. He says Arda chairman Cde Basil Nyabadza was bribed after Rautenbach allegedly bought him a house. He says Zanu-PF secretary for administration Didymus Mutasa was involved in the shady deals. Cdes Mutasa and Nyabadza can defend themselves if they can, but Prof Moyo has already done so.

Cde Mliswa must understand this fundamental principle of law that if you allege, the onus is yours to prove. We don’t think he has proof to back his allegations, as in his illegitimate claims of entitlement of shares in Rautenbach’s investments.

It must be stated, however that by criticising Cde Mliswa, we are not defending Rautenbach. We are also not suggesting that Cde Mliswa was wrong in exposing corruption and bad governance. We are only saying he must not seek to convince us that his own corruption, hypocrisy, blackmail and extortionist methods are good business.