BY PHYLLIS MBANJE

A TWO-MONTH standoff between doctors and the government has brought the health delivery system in the country virtually to its knees, exposing the government’s non-commitment to guaranteeing universal healthcare.

Government’s “command” response of firing over 300 of the doctors further perpetuated the crisis which has reached unimaginable proportions, and this has opened the door for other countries — with Britain reportedly at the forefront — to snatch the doctors.

This is likely to pave way for another massive brain drain typical of the one witnessed at the turn of the millennium when thousands of highly experienced and qualified professionals left Zimbabwe for other countries.

The corridors of Parirenyatwa Group of Hospitals, one of Zimbabwe’s largest referral hospitals, are now virtually empty and devoid of the mad rush of human feet and the squeaky sound of stretchers loaded with patients.

There are no white-coated doctors with stethoscopes dangling from their necks, as they dash from one ward to the next exchanging easy banter with the youthful nurses tending to their patients.

The hive of activity has been replaced by an eerie silence.

Instead, an occasional security guard prances about the casualty section whistling softly, as his baton stick hangs from his belt and swings with each step he takes.

A few patients make enquiries at the open small window and, after a few minutes, walk away in dejection. This scenario is replicated at most public health facilities scattered across the country.

Over the years, the public health system has slowly disintegrated largely due to lack of funding to sustain the growing base of patients.

Earlier this year, officials from the Health ministry, including minister Obadiah Moyo, witnessed a rare and sad moment when the head of the paediatric unit, Azza Mashumba, broke down in tears as she recounted how they were losing babies due to avoidable reasons.

She said patients were dying from treatable diseases at government hospitals, owing to the shortage of basic medical equipment, medicines and other accessories.

“A pregnant mother comes here at Mbuya Nehanda. I can hear the foetal heart. The baby is in distress. We come here to the main theatre, but the foetal heart is dwindling, it’s going. We get into theatre and I am ready to receive the baby, but I am given a stillbirth,” she said. “I come to work to certify dead bodies, that’s not why I am here … We are not working, we are not helping patients.”

Her shocking revelation was one of the first big signs that the heartbeat of the medical system was slowly fading away in the country’s public health facilities.

The video trended for months and helped bring into perspective just how badly the healthcare system had deteriorated.

When the junior doctors announced that they were incapacitated and could no longer come to work, the situation took a nastier turn.

Patients were turned away and those already admitted discharged and sent home.

The misery has been growing ever since and now the private health facilities are bulking under the huge influx of patients who are coming from the public hospitals. They, too, are struggling.

There is now a stampede for mission hospitals like Karanda, which are still offering better services.

Over the years, Karanda has remained resolute in providing quality and affordable healthcare.

The dedicated staff continue to prioritise patients, striving to give the best of care to restore health and preserve life.

But the numbers are now becoming too much for them and slowly, the staff is getting overwhelmed.

This is the last line of defence and if it crumbles, disaster will strike again, harder this time.

There are reports that student doctors are now tending to patients at major hospitals and although officials at Parirenyatwa have refuted these allegations, it is only a matter of time before the hospitals completely shut their doors.

But how did the country get here?

One of the main thrusts of the new government at independence in 1980 was to increase access to quality healthcare to citizens who had been kept at bay by the colonial regime, which provided the barest of health services to the black population.

It is no wonder the then President Robert Mugabe’s government made great strides to improve health delivery and with determination, solidified the grassroots healthcare facilities, which mostly serviced the poor.

Throughout the 1980s, the government worked hard to ensure that pregnant women received the best care along with their babies.

The country’s immunisation programme was ranked among the best in southern Africa.

The health personnel then were well equipped as well as remunerated.

Nurses and doctors were highly revered in their respective communities and their parents could openly brag, with almost every child in school desiring to become a doctor.

Patients were given first class treatment and indeed hospitals were healing homes.

The malaise

But the beginning of the 1990s witnessed an abrupt change. The economic challenges that besieged the country did not spare the hospitals, which bore the worst brunt.

Suddenly, there were reports of drug shortages and nurses and doctors leaving for greener pastures.

Many relocated to the United Kingdom, where they have remained to date.

As the political situation played out, the situation in the hospitals further deteriorated.

Consistently, the national budget failed to honour the Abuja Declaration, which urges governments to commit at least 15% of the national cake to health. Without adequate funding except from the international donors, the healthcare system took a further nosedive.

This was worsened by corrupt practices of senior government officials, who dipped their fingers in the funding pools from the donors, resulting in reduction of financial support.

Stakeholders and activists made repeated calls to government to seriously re-consider its funding mechanism for health, with domestic funding becoming a critical topic.

While the healthcare collapsed, the government officials and their families became medical
tourists, shunning the local facilities which have become death traps for many people of no means.

India is one of the countries that have been besieged by well-to-do patients from Zimbabwe.

With state-of-the-art hospitals and dedicated teams of well-motivated health personnel, it remains a lure for those who can afford, or those who publicly ask for donations.

The broken promises

The Zanu PF election manifesto makes wide-ranging promises on health and President Emmerson Mnangagwa towards the 2018 elections pledged that the health infrastructure would be improved, that he would create more posts for health personnel as well as accessible affordable medicines.

The manifesto also promised free medical care for cancer patients; at least one hospital per district, improved health services in resettlement areas, reduction of hospital fees by 50% and pursuing the health for all policy, among others.

Community Working Group on Health executive director Itai Rusike once wrote an open letter to the President, reminding him of the promises he made.

“Zimbabwe needs sustained investments in primary healthcare to revitalise the health system to close gaps in access to services and to address the causes of ill health,” he said.

The new Health minister, Moyo, also promised world-class facilities soon after he was appointed to head the ministry, but this, too, is proving to be an elusive dream.

The empty wards and empty drug shelves all testify to the failure by government to prioritise this fundamental human right.

There are no painkillers and people living with HIV and Aids are still struggling to get their drugs on time.

by MOSES MATENGA

FORMER top banker, James Mushore, struck gold when he landed the coveted Harare town clerk job in March 2016, but in just 24 hours, he had been booted out.

Mushore, believed to be an ally of the late former MDC leader and Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai, received a hostile reception at Town House, where he was rejected by former Local Government minister Saviour Kasukuwere and immediately fired.

He had been hired by the MDC-dominated council to replace purged town clerk Tendai Mahachi, who had been a thorn in the flesh of the councillors for many years.

A protracted fight ensued, leading to then mayor, Bernard Manyenyeni, being suspended from office.

The political wars of Mushore represents the fights between the ruling Zanu PF party and the opposition MDC since the beginning of the new millennium.

MDC has won a majority of local urban seats since its inception and has taken control of major cities, including Harare, Bulawayo, Chitungwiza, Gweru, and Kwekwe, ending Zanu PF dominance since independence.

However, observers said the problem with the town clerk’s position, equivalent to a chief executive officer in a company, was more political as Zanu PF and the MDC fight for turf.

Local Government expert Precious Shumba said the conflicts were as a result of “structural conflict” between policymakers and technocrats.

“There has always been structural conflict between policymakers and technocrats in local authorities and there is a history to that,” Shumba said.

“Town clerks have for a long time been viewed as saboteurs, incompetent and corrupt such that they deliberately did not facilitate the implementation of the resolutions by councillors.

“There is a historical relationship between the senior council management and elected councillors. Councillors, especially from the opposition have always held the view that the bureaucrats they found in office served Zanu PF and central government interests.

“As a result of this long-held mistrust, a majority of the decisions and resolutions at local authorities’ level have not been implemented, and the bureaucrats have always cited lack of financial resources, yet in practice they are the ones who should provide the technical guidance to the elected policymakers.”

Shumba, however, said the situation may have changed now, thanks to Minister July Moyo’s more liberal approach.

“A lot of the town clerks and town secretaries used to enjoy the shield of the Local Government minister, but this is changing with July Moyo’s more liberal approach. Now the councillors are finding it easier to reprimand and even suspend errant officials,” he said.

He said due to political pressure in most cases, technocrats were not implementing council resolutions and most of them were used to the chief executive mentality of doing things as they please.

MDC shadow deputy minister for Local Government Clifford Hlatshwayo, said friction was rife but not in all local authorities and bemoaned the involvement of some of the town clerks in local government issues.

Hlatshwayo said some of the town clerks were conflicted and unable to serve the people.

“We have a problem with those who take political party jackets to work,” he said.

“MDC councils are clear in terms of delivering, but their efforts are sometimes frustrated by political interferences with town clerks brought in by Zanu PF to frustrate their efforts.”

He, however, said though rife, it was not happening in all local authorities.

“They shouldn’t involve themselves with politics. Residents want basics, including potable water, good roads among other things and we don’t need politics to have all that,” he said.

Former Harare mayor, Bernard Manyenyeni, who was thrown under the bus several times by former Local Government ministers Ignatius Chombo and Kasukuwere over the town clerk issue, said the problem at most town houses was always political.

“We don’t know who is ultimately responsible for the workers and the chief worker at Town House. From a political point of view, you have never seen a town clerk having problems with his councillors rushing to the MDC. They don’t lobby or seek protection from the MDC, who are their employers,” Manyenyeni said.

In 2016, Manyenyeni was at one time suspended and subsequently arrested over his actions against Mahachi and hiring of the town clerk.

Mushore was regarded as sympathetic to the MDC and Kasukuwere did not want him anywhere near the council headquarters.

The protracted fight saw Mahachi being retired and Mushore unemployed, not before he was paid an astronomical severance package.

Mahachi was perceived as Chombo’s blue-eyed boy and allegedly immersed in most scandalous deals involving the former Zanu PF secretary for administration.

The former town clerk was fingered in several reports by councillors as having been an accomplice to Chombo’s shoddy deals.

Mahachi was named in a report by councillors as having illegally dished out land to Chombo and businessman Philip Chiyangwa among others, but he survived attempts by the MDC councillors to push him out.

In Chitungwiza, council is locked up in a fierce clash with town clerk George Makunde, who was recently suspended on allegations of gross incompetence.

Ironically, Makunde is Zanu PF secretary for administration in Mashonaland Central, while the MDC is in charge of the council.

Chitungwiza mayor, Lovemore Maiko, in September suspended Makunde on the grounds of absentism from work, gross insubordination and disobeying instructions.

Makunde had allegedly refused to produce his personal profile to councillors as well as contracts of employment and conditions of service for all senior managers.

In Bulawayo, MDC councillors are also embroiled in nasty clashes with town clerk Christopher Dube, who at some point was almost involved in fisticuffs with deputy mayor Tinashe Kambarami.

Kambarami and another councillor, Silas Chigora, forcibly removed Dube from office, arguing he was suspended over various charges including abuse of office.

But Dube could have none of that as he blasted the duo using unprintable words, describing his employers as nonentities.

Bulawayo mayor Solomon Mguni later lifted the town clerk’s suspension.

In Gweru, town clerk Elizabeth Gwatipedza is on suspension over several allegations, another indication of frosty relations between elected officials and technocrats.

In former Harare mayor Muchadeyi Masunda’s book, an ideal town clerk should be: “…an individual of unquestionable integrity and should not pander to the whims of either the mayor, councillors, government ministers or political parties.”

Under the circumstances, such a town clerk remains elusive.

BY RUTENDO MATANHIKE / MOSES MATENGA

ZANU PF legislators yesterday walked out of a Tendai Biti-chaired Public Accounts Committee sitting, where Sakunda Holdings was expected to give oral evidence regarding about US$3 billion advanced to the company for Command Agriculture without parliamentary approval.

The boycott was in retaliation to the refusal by the MDC MPs to recognise President Emmerson Mnangagwa and occasionally walking out of Parliament each time the Zanu PF leader attends Parliament.

After the boycott, the meeting, which was supposed to clear the air on the abuse of money under the government’s ambitious Command Agriculture programme, was aborted for lack of a quorum.

The MDC has refused to recognise Mnangagwa as the legitimate leader, accusing the Zanu PF leader of stealing last year’s elections.

MDC MPs walked out on Mnangagwa’s State of the Nation Address (Sona) last month, following a similar incident in September last year.

Earlier this year, they snubbed Mnangagwa again when he graced Parliament for the mid-term budget presentation by Finance minister, Mthuli Ncube.

The boycotts forced Mudenda to withdraw their allowances for five months and ban them from asking questions during the question-and-answer sessions.

But on Thursday, the opposition MPs were at it again, snubbing Ncube’s budget presentation which was graced by Mnangagwa, insisting that they would continue to snub Mnangagwa because he was an illegitimate leader.

But Zanu PF yesterday hit back, walking out on Biti and forcing the abandonment of the much-awaited questioning of Sakunda executives, claiming there was no justification to attend a meeting addressed by someone who does not recognise Mnangagwa.

Sakunda Holdings chief executive Chitambo Mberikwazvo said he only found out the meeting had been cancelled soon after arriving.

“I arrived here at Parliament at precisely 11:29am and was told to wait in the sitting lounge.
About 10 minutes later, I was told that the meeting had been cancelled. I was told that I will be notified on when I should come back. I was told I should expect to come back on November 25,” Mberikwazvo told journalists.

Speaking to journalists after the snub, Norton legislator Temba Mliswa (independent) said Zanu PF MPs were justified to walk out of the meeting as long as the opposition MPs refused to recognise Mnangagwa.

“They asked why they were supposed to be compelled to sit for the meeting when their counterparts could not recognise the President of the country. They concluded to wait for the resolution to be made by the Committee on Standing Rules and Orders,” he said.

Mliswa said Parliament should not be used for political agendas, but ought to be used as a space where discussions on development of the country were topical.

“My position on this issue is very clear: Parliament should not be used as a war zone between politicians. Even Americans and the European Union recognised President Emmerson Mnangagwa and, therefore, this continued rift should stop,” he said.

“Even the much-needed dialogue in the country cannot happen under these circumstances. Legitimately, Zanu PF has got a strong reason for what they did today, but the strategy being used by MDC is not working.”

Meanwhile, the MDC has come under immense criticism for boycotting the budget presentation by
Ncube after participating in the pre-budget seminar in Victoria Falls, earning huge amounts in allowances.

Speaker of Parliament Jacob Mudenda said due process would be followed on the matter, but refused to shed more light on the kind of action he was going to take.

“There is a process that has to be followed and we are following that process and that is all I can say for now,” he said.

Zanu PF said the action by the MDC was self-defeating and an embarrassment to those who voted them into Parliament.

“Such action is immaturity of the highest political order. One wishes to advice MDC-A that Zimbabwe is not a charity nation. We must all focus on productivity, growth and job creation. The time for political Lilliputians is over. Zimbabwe is, indeed, not for sale,” Zanu PF spokesperson Simon Khaya-Moyo said.

Political analyst Alexander Rusero said the MDC parliamentarians would regret their antics at some stage, describing their action as shameful.

But analyst Ibbo Mandaza said the boycott by the MDC was successful in irritating Mnangagwa as well as hyping the legitimacy issue.

He said it was best to highlight the legitimacy issue because Mnangagwa “lost” in last year’s polls.

Opinion: Anthony Hawkins

ZIMBABWE’S 2020 budget presented on Thursday moves the economy even more deeply into the realm of dartboard economics. Forecasts made in the pre-budget “strategy” document, and the International Monetary Fund (IMF) Staff Monitored Programme in April, not to mention the 2019 budget a year ago, have been junked.

Not just junked but overshot by massive three-digit percentage increases. They are replaced by some numbers — not the full range as published a year ago — plucked out of air, or perhaps from the dartboard.

A year ago, inflation was projected, with impressive exactitude, at 22,6%, while the IMF SMP — also exact to one decimal point — forecast 80,8% with a year-end number of just under 50%. Within hours of his budget presentation, ZimStats published a monthly inflation number for October of 38,8% which came as a shock in the wake of official claims that inflation “spiked” in June at 39%, which it obviously did not.

Year-on-year inflation, which Minister Ncube apparently thinks we are too intellectually challenged to be able to work out for ourselves, jumped almost 100 points to 440% from 353% in September. Food prices were up almost 50% in a month, while electricity prices rose 117%, which was no surprise.

These numbers suggest inflation in 2019 will average around 250%, which is significantly higher than the 215% imputed from the budget numbers. In the 2019 budget, inflation was forecast with great precision at 22,6%.

With nominal GDP jumping 195% to $130,8 billion (still more exactitude) and real GDP falling 6,5%, the implication is that inflation in 2019 would average around 215%, which now looks far too low.
Indeed, revised inflation estimates imply that the real GDP fell much more than officially estimated, perhaps reaching, minus 10%.

For the record, the SMP put 2019 GDP at $70 billion, while just two months ago the pre-budget document estimated $113,5 billion. In just eight weeks, it has been increased 15%. Treasury forecasters really need to try harder.

For 2020, the acclaimed year of “prosperity”, nominal GDP grows 160% — less than in 2019 — but with slower inflation (150%) real GDP grows about 3%, which looks optimistic, especially in the light of Ncube’s justifications for this return to positive growth.

Investment by the private sector will increase he says. Really. Better rainfall, tax incentives — including subsidising employment for “youths” (age unspecified) — marginal tax reductions, far exceeded by inflation, and, of course, improved macro-economic stability and financial discipline.

The minister managed to admit that despite repeated claims of a budget surplus, the actual deficit of $5,2 billion is 230% higher than projected in his 2019 budget, while in a return to quasi-fiscal activities, the government has been “spending outside the budget.” No surprise there of course, but an outright contradiction of his many “reform” promises that have not been honoured.

Government spending estimated at $8,2 billion a year ago will come in at over $26 billion — an overshoot of 218%. Fortunately, revenue driven by hyperinflation (353% in September), fuel duty and the IMTT 2% tax is 220% ahead of budget.

In the light of these massive forecasting errors — that extend to the SMP and pre-budget strategy as well as the 2019 budget — it has to be asked why the Finance ministry bothers. Parliament will be asked to approve a budget based on numbers that in 2019 bore no relation to reality. Why will it be any different this year? Have the Treasury’s forecasting skills improved miraculously in the last two to three months? It seems unlikely.

Ncube’s budget should, at the very least, have included — an annexure showing the real levels of tax, revenue and spending. After all corporates listed on the ZSE are required to use inflation-accounting techniques, so why not government?

Take the case of the pernicious 2% transactions tax. When it was introduced in October 2018, there was a threshold of $10 or $13,4 in 2019 prices. In mid-year this was doubled to $20, but in real terms, adjusted for inflation, it is now worth $5.

In the 2020 budget the threshold is raised to $100 or $25 as of October 2019 and by year-end an estimated $19. So in purchasing power, a ten-fold increase in the threshold since last October will be an equivalent to a 40% increase. By mid-2020, the threshold will be lower than when it was first introduced in 2018.

Apply the same logic to the marginal reduction in VAT from 15% to 14,5% and in corporate tax to 24% from 25%, and it is obvious that effective tax rates will rise.

Inflation-adjusted numbers make a mockery also of Ncube’s claims to have ended austerity. In 2020, real government spending will fall another 5% and will be 40% lower than in 2018. His claimed increase in capital spending turns out to be a 15% increase, but still leaves the capital budget one-third lower than in 2018.

As for the employment budget, it will rise 130% in 2020, but in real terms it will fall 10% and next year the real employment budget will be 70% below its 2018 level. So no one will be surprised to see public servants, doctors, assuming they have not all been fired, nurses and teachers on strike.

The ravages of inflation are only fully evident after the event. Even today, some in the financial sector and, of course, the RBZ, have yet to get their heads around what is happening. How else could “investors” — for which read losers of other people’s money — agree to lend government $300 million for six months at 14%.

Wimpish investment managers will say they are forced to subscribe for worthless paper by the government’s prescribed assets regulations. Minister Ncube bemoaning the fact that the pension and insurance industry is not compliant urges “industry players to ensure adherence to their compliance plans”

Obviously, no responsible investment manager can throw away one-third of his client’s funds in just six months to win ministerial approval. One wonders whether Ncube or governor Mangudya deliberately invests their own money at a massive loss. Savers and pensioners are there to be punished by cynical and unprincipled politicians and central bankers.

The sober reality, strengthened in this budget, is that Zimbabwe is deep in the throes of an inflation psychosis. By massively increasing government revenues and spending, albeit in nominal terms, Ncube, having abandoned what surely was one of the world’s shortest-ever austerity programme, is embedding inflationary expectations more deeply into the Zimbabwe psyche.

Even the fast-diminishing gaggle of new dispensation apologists will have enormous difficult in portraying this budget in positive terms, the more so after factoring in the October inflation number.

If inflation is really as high as 150%, then real aggregate demand will continue to fall and the minister’s 3% growth target — like every one of his 2019 targets will be missed.

 Anthony Hawkins is a retired professor of economics. He writes in his personal capacity

BY BLESSED MHLANGA

ZIMBABWE Liberation Platform, a splinter group from the Zimbabwe National Liberation War Veterans Association (ZNLWVA), has chickened out from confronting shortcomings of President Emmerson Mnangagwa’s government, and now exonerates him from any wrongdoing.

Addressing a Press conference, yesterday Wilbert Sadomba, former ZNLWA secretary for education, said Mnangagwa was the only good man in his government.

“He is doing his best and he is upholding the Constitution, but as the President, he can’t be everywhere. In the military, finance or education, he appoints people and these people are letting the nation down. There is high corruption in the country and it is causing our people much suffering,” he said.

ZLP was launched end of October, at a Press conference, where the war veterans came out guns blazing alleging that Zanu PF had been hijacked and had lost its moral compass that fuelled the liberation war.

The war veterans accused Mnangagwa of running down the economy.

“We did not fight the war so that we can have political violence or corruption. We fought for democracy and to get out of oppression at the hands of (Ian) Smith, but not to continue under a Zanu PF government. The Zanu PF we knew during the war is not the same we know now,” Sadomba said at the time.

He was later to claim that he had been summoned by Central Intelligence Organisation operatives
for a two-hour meeting, although he refused to divulge the details.

ZLP yesterday said they were coming in with a view to contribute solutions to the crisis, which has seen the economy tumbling, disposable incomes evaporating and social services collapsing.

“We have a serious problem of polarisation. National issues have failed to get attention owing to political differences and, as war veterans, we need to take a stand and find a solution that changes the course of our country,” Sadomba said.

“We are clear that this cannot be done by war veterans who are servants of a particular political party.”

Political parties have been battling for the support of war veterans, who have been the force behind Zanu PF’s stay in power.

BY FARAI MATIASHE

MEDIA Institute of Southern Africa-Zimbabwe Chapter director Thabani Moyo has called on internet governance stakeholders to move their focus from geographical to continental approaches when fighting the clampdown of online platforms by the State and its apparatus.

In January this year, during protests over a 150% fuel price increase, the government responded by shutting down the internet to restrict access to information.

Addressing a regional multi-stakeholder workshop in Harare yesterday, Moyo said there was need for stakeholders to strengthen their voices in fighting internet freedom rights violations as a collective rather than in isolation.

“Sadc has set out parameters through its cyber security model laws and the African Union model laws on data protection, among others, which our respective member States are utilising or adopting to strengthen their stranglehold on the internet. Therefore, the countries of southern Africa are speaking to and advising each other on how to shrink online space,” he said.

“This requires that our focus as stakeholders moves from geographical centric interventions by taking a bird’s eye view towards regional or continental approaches of galvanising voices that stand in solidarity when attacks of online platforms are emerging. That movement needs to be strengthened because when democracy is on retreat that is the only solidarity that is the first line of defence.”

Moyo said there had been a shift by African governments from shutting down of the internet to use of high costs to minimise the number of people who access the internet on the continent.

“Going forward, we believe that the three As are critical. The issue of availability of the platforms, we need to be galvanised to be a defence line against wanton shutdown or threatening of the internet, issues of affordability. From the reports that are emerging, it shows that there is a strategic shift from wanton shut downs to high costs to inhibit usage of online platforms,” he
said.

Moyo said to ensure that people remained online, there was need for multi-stakeholders including those from the academia, government, civil society groups, regulators and the media to come up with effective strategies that recognise the significance of the internet to democracy in the country.

According to the Postal and Telecommunications Regulatory Authority of Zimbabwe, there has been a decline in the use of the internet in the country. In December 2018, there was 62,9% of the country’s population that had access to the internet and that had dropped to 57,2% by June this year.

BY TERRY MADYAUTA

FC PLATINUM gaffer Lizwe Sweswe has vowed to stop Highlanders’ unbeaten streak when the two teams meet at Mandava Stadium tomorrow as he targets top spot on the Castle Lager Premier League log.

The champions are aiming for their third straight league title and face a tough hurdle when they take on a Bosso side that has not lost in its last 10 league matches.

Highlanders last lost a league match in August against Triangle but they drew six other matches.

Bosso have been a different side since Dutchman Pieter de Jongh took over in September.

But Sweswe sees an opportunity for his side to continue exerting pressure on their title rivals Caps United and Chicken Inn and he is not reading much into Highlanders’ impressive numbers.

The miners approach this blockbuster clash in high spirits, having triumphed in their previous encounter against Manica Diamonds on Wednesday while also riding on the fact that Mandava stadium has not been a favourable hunting ground for Highlanders in recent times.

Bosso will hope to bounce back to winning ways after settling for a share of spoils with Ngezi Platinum during a mid-week fixture played at Barbourfields stadium.

“The mid-week result goes a long way in motivating us for this very important match against Highlanders,” said Sweswe.

“They (Highlanders) have been doing good and their statistics for the last matches are impressive but we are not going to read much into that.

“Our main goal is to collect three points at the end of the day because dropping points at this stage of the season would put all our objectives in jeopardy.”

Former Highlanders skipper Rahman Kutsanzira will be looking to inflict pain on his former paymasters, and from the other end former FC Platinum midfielder Nqobizitha Masuku returns to Zvishavane for the first time since he left the club.