Harare – A Zanu-PF activist who led a group of people who booed former First Lady Grace Mugabe during the ruling party’s youth rally at White City Stadium in Bulawayo last year has been granted liberation hero status following his death in a car accident this week.
Magura Charumbira, who was 34 and Zanu-PF Bulawayo central district chairperson, died in a crash, when the Mercedes-Benz E-Class he was travelling in rammed into the back of a stationary haulage truck trailer along the Bulawayo-Harare highway near Norton, a small town about 40 kilometres west of Harare.
The accident occurred on the morning of January 8.
A letter by Zanu-PF secretary for administration Obert Mpofu to Secretary to the President and Cabinet Misheck Sibanda read: “His Excellency, the President and first secretary of Zanu-PF, Cde E D Mnangagwa, has conferred a liberation hero status to the late Cde Magura Magura Charumbira, who died on January 8, 2018 at Norton. The family can be contacted through our Bulawayo provincial office.
“I shall be most welcome if you would make the usual arrangements for his burial and pay him payment of his benefits to his dependents. He is from Masvingo province.”
Charumbira booed Grace Mugabe during the rally on November 4, 2017, when she started attacking then Vice-President Emmerson Mnangagwa, now Zimbabwe head of State.
The booing incensed then President Robert Mugabe, who went into overdrive and attacked Mnangagwa, threatening to dismiss him from his job.
Two days later, Mnangagwa was sacked from government before he skipped the country, alleging his life was in danger.
Charumbira was hauled before the courts, but was later acquitted.
A few days later, the Zimbabwe military intervened through “Operation Restore Legacy”, which was enacted on November 14 and saw Mugabe being kicked out of Zanu-PF and resigning from government, with Mnangagwa returning to Zimbabwe to take over the reins.
At many rallies, Mugabe had accused Zanu-PF officials of denigrating him using Mnangagwa’s name.
African News Agency/ANA
