2023-09-13 00:22:50
After his controversial re-election, Zimbabwe’s President Emmerson Mnangagwa has filled two important ministerial posts with his son and nephew. More than 20 ministers and ten representatives took their oath of office at a ceremony in the capital Harare on Tuesday. Mnangagwa’s son Kudakwashe David Mnangagwa took over as deputy finance minister. The president’s nephew, Tongai Mnangagwa, was appointed deputy tourism minister.
The president’s son is the deputy of Mthuli Ncube, whom critics blame for the country’s economic collapse and massive inflation and who remained in office regardless.
The opposition described the new government as the “worst” since the country’s independence. “Comprised of (Mnangagwa’s) friends, family, loyalists and the least qualified, the cabinet is the worst since Zimbabwe’s independence in 1980,” said Promise Mkwananzi, spokesman for the main opposition Citizens Coalition for Change (CCC).
According to the electoral commission, the 80-year-old incumbent Mnangagwa won the election on August 23 in the first round. The opposition rejects the result, and African election observers also expressed doubts about the legality of the re-election.
Zimbabwe has been ruled by the presidential party ZANU-PF since independence from the colonial power Great Britain in 1980. Initially, autocrat Robert Mugabe was in power for 37 years. When the military staged a coup against the head of state in 2017, Mugabe’s deputy Mnangagwa came into office.
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