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SINCE his dismissal from Zanu-PF, former secretary for Administration and Presidential Affairs Minister Mr Didymus Mutasa has been all over the private media seeking to vent his bitterness and project himself as some Paul that has met his Damascene moment.
Of course the same can be said to other members of the putschist cabal that was fronted by former Vice President Joice Mujuru whose numbers include Jabulani Sibanda and Rugare Gumbo who have suddenly become overnight darlings of the private media.
While this is understandable given the bitterness in the foiled plotters, we take particular umbrage at Mr Mutasa who has now gone beyond the call of this putschist duty to reveal state secrets of how the country’s intelligence operates.
As we report elsewhere in this paper, under Section 4 of the Official Secrets Act it is a criminal offence for any person who has in his possession or under his control any secret official code, document or information that has been entrusted in confidence to him by a person holding an office in the service of the State; or he has obtained or to which he has had access owing to his position as a person who holds or has held office in the service of the State to communicate or publish it to any person.
The offence attracts a jail term of not more than 20 years.
Mr Mutasa, as legal experts are pointing out, is clearly in breach of the provisions of the Official Secrets Act by what he has revealed to the private media and as he promises to do in the future.
We thought Mr Mutasa knew better, as well as Dr Mujuru no doubt should.
He should not be spurred by the heat of his bitter moment of life outside Zanu-PF and Government to jeopardise this country’s security, which is sacrosanct.
Mr Mutasa, who is 80 years of age, will also be better advised not to give away his twilight years that easily to being a guest of the state, which he is certainly a candidate of and especially so if he continues to break the laws of this country.
What is more important, though, is for Mr Mutasa and his ilk to understand that the cheerleading they are getting from the private media is self-serving on the part of those media whose agenda has been to besmirch President Mugabe and the Zanu-PF led Government.
Mr Mutasa would surely know this from his time in the party and government.
It is rather surprising how he can easily pawn himself in that cheap game.
Meanwhile, one wonders what value the so-called admission by Mr Mutasa that Zanu-PF lost to the MDC in 2008 adds to our national discourse?
By the way, it is known that MDC marginally won by one seat in the Parliamentary elections where it got 100 seats against Zanu-PF’s 99 with Zanu-PF winning the popular vote by 1 110 649 to 1 041 176 meaning that more people still voted Zanu-PF than MDC while President Mugabe’s vote in that first round was ate into by the “bhora musango” tactic and the Simba Makoni break-away.
President Mugabe polled 43.2 percent of the vote against Tsvangirai’s 47.9 percent, which, as the law stipulated was below 50+1 percent to be declared an outright winner.
A run-off was necessitated, which Tsvangirai chose to purport to withdraw from in the last minute but was won by President Mugabe who got 85.5 percent against his rival’s 9.3 percent.
This gave the mandate to President Mugabe and it is for the precise reason why during the inclusive Government talks which sought to deal with the hung parliament (not President Mugabe’s loss) the premise was that President Mugabe was duly elected President of the Republic.
To continue harping about the supposed win of Tsvangirai when he clearly won a battle and lost the war is clearly an exercise in futility.
More shockingly, it brings to question the sanity of those harping on about this closed chapter and the seriousness of newspapers that seek to drag the whole nation into this useless exercise.
As for Mr Mutasa himself, he is advised to act his age, not shoe size.
Online Reporter