President Emmerson Mnangagwa’s wife also shouted at one
ZIMRA employee for staring at her in a shock outburst.
The incident allegedly took place in early May as the first
lady returned from an unexplained road trip to Mozambique.
A source told ZimLive: “She got out of her vehicle with
aides and started shouting at everyone, accusing the border officials of being
corrupt. She started asking those who were close for their names. She picked on
ZIMRA officer and accused him of staring at her as if she was a prostitute.
“She then demanded to see the ZIMRA manager, Tichaona
Phiri, who was in his office. She sent her aides to get him. He was literally
manhandled by his belt to meet her. She shouted at him for not coming to meet
her and then instructed her boys to ‘take him and go with him.’
“The poor manager was moved around the border while being
held by his belt. She kept on shouting. When the manager was finally let go,
she demanded that he should be fired as well as the ZIMRA officer accused of
staring.”
Phiri, the regional manager for ZIMRA, has reportedly been
working from home since the incident. Other ZIMRA staff were reportedly left
“shaken”.
Colleagues described Phiri as a “no-nonsense man who wants
things done properly.”
While it remains unclear what prompted the outburst from
the president’s wife, some have linked it to two incidents at the border during
which goods linked to the first family or their associates were held up.
“Phiri seized 15 trucks loaded with chrome which had been
under-weighed. The trucks were destined for shipment in Beira and had the
fingerprints of the first family. It took the intervention of the ZIMRA
commissioner for customs (Batsirai Chadzingwa) for the trucks to be released,”
a source at the border said.
“On another occasion, one of the sons imported some Italian
booze which was labelled in Italian. It was held up because no-one at the
border understood Italian. After angry phone calls, Chadzingwa stepped in once
more to get it released.”
Chadzingwa reportedly visited the Forbes border “on a
fact-finding mission” after the Auxillia Mnangagwa incident.
A ZIMRA spokesman said they would not be commenting.
Auxillia Mnangagwa is given to vituperative outbursts. Her
staff, civil servants and her husband’s “girlfriends” have been at the
receiving end of her sharp tongue.
In 2019, an audio was leaked of her shouting – for eight
minutes – at Colonel Samson Murombo, commander of the 1 Presidential Guard
Infantry Battalion, as she accused him of spying on her.
She accused Murombo of using someone called Manjoro –
believed to be a member of her security detail – to spy on her. She also
complained about a “Mhlanga” that she claimed was deployed to her office to spy
on her.
She told Murombo she was driving from Bulawayo to Harare
and invited him to kill her on the way.
“If you don’t shoot me before I get there, we’ll kill each
other in your office,” she vowed.
In 2020, she summoned ZBC head of news Gilbert Nyambabvu to
her office and spent 25 minutes hectoring him for suspending her favourite
cameraman. Nyambabvu was removed a month later.
Last year, in November, her meddling in state media was
laid bare again when she forced The Herald newspaper to apologise over a
headline she felt did not sufficiently reflect her influence and importance.
The Herald, which must publish a story about her daily, ran
with the headline ‘Colleges endorse First Lady’s programme.’ After she called
the newspaper in fury, the editor was forced to apologise in the next edition
on November 4.
“We wish to state that the correct headline should have
been ‘Universities, colleges and vocational training centres endorse First
Lady’s programme’,” the apology said. Zimlive
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