BY FREEMAN MAKOPA

CHANTER Seh Calaz, born Tawanda Mumanyi, is one of the golden picks of the country’s dancehall movement, having sung his way to fame since 2013, picking up a number of controversies along the way.

Although the song Mabhanditi appeared to remain an underground track, the release of Mumota Murikubvira — which glorifies the use of marijuana — saw him dominating the airwaves.

He was voted the Best Male Dancehall Artiste at the King of the Dancehall Contest held in December 2013, where he pocketed R10 000.

A keen fashionista, the 29-year-old launched his own clothing label, Mabhanditi, which produces his stage costumes.

In May 2018, he was fined $100 by a Harare magistrate for recording the controversial song, Kurova Hohwa, which was classified as “obscene”.

On weed and smoking

I have sung a lot about weed, but I don’t smoke it.

Sexual innuendo

No comment. I got into trouble the last time over the same issue. People choose what they want to hear from it so I can’t keep explaining.

Dealing with fame

It’s only an issue when you are starting. In essence, it is a cycle of some sort. When you have passed the first phase of unknown to famous, you go back to being the person everyone knew before the fame. Humility is key because it’s the same people who made you famous so you have to still relate with them the same way every day.

Other interests outside music?

I am not at liberty to disclose other interests suffice to say that they are there and would ensure a bright future post-music career if that ever happens.

I spend time watching movies, especially Nigerian movies. I find them funny. Here and there I do find time to watch soccer.

Music choices

I listen to all music. You don’t know what you will learn and from who. I can’t pinpoint exactly but I’m fond of old timers who always had that genuine touch about them.

Best kept-secret

I’m a disciple of mastery. So I mastered music and that is my life.

Controversial love life

I don’t comment on such issues.

By Everson Mushava

A FIVE-MEMBER integrity panel set up by MDC leader Nelson Chamisa last year to probe corrupt activities involving party deployees in local authorities will target Harare City Council as its first assignment, investigating all the deals entered into by the opposition-run municipality.

Addressing journalists yesterday, the integrity and accountability panel chairman, Advocate Thabani Mpofu said his panel would recommend prosecution for criminal conduct not only in the MDC-run councils, but all tiers of government the party members are deployed.

Mpofu said his panel would not be averse to co-operation with government institutions such as the police, the Zimbabwe Anti-Corruption Commission and the National Prosecuting Authority, but where those institutions would have failed to co-operate the panel would consider other legal means provided by the law.

“We will, in the coming weeks, turn our attention to the City of Harare. We intend to deal in the first instance with all the contracts, running contracts, unclosed contract, to which the City of Harare is part,” he said.

“We will look at the nature and number of contracts to which the City of Harare is part to, the identities of the contractors, the numbers by value, both in US dollar terms and in local dollar terms of the amounts involved in the contracts, the manner the contracts were awarded and the efficiency with which they are being performed, including the standard of work discharged by the contracted companies.

“We want to establish whether the people of Harare are receiving the benefits of those contracts.”
Last year, Chamisa formed the panel, which he said would investigate allegations of corruption within MDC-run councils to foster a culture of accountability and integrity.

The MDC controls the majority of urban local authorities in the country.

The councils have been accused of corruption, with Zanu PF using the allegations to discredit the opposition party’s ability to run the affairs of the country. But last year, Chamisa said he would weed out corrupt elements from the MDC.

Mpofu said the panel’s work won’t be a witch-hunting exercise and will not be limited to councils only.

BY DESMOND CHINGARANDE

POLICE have intensified the search for a top Defence ministry official, Danison Muvandi, who is on the run after allegedly swindling government of $306 135 in a cleaning service scam.

Prosecutor George Manokore said this while remanding other top Defence ministry officials, Peter Muchakadzi and Kunofiwa Madondo, who are facing similar charges.

Manokore told magistrate Hosea Mujaya that the police had arrested three suspects, Muchakadzi, Madondo and Laxwell Ngara and their trial date would be decided after the arrest of Muvandi.

Allegations are that from March to June 2019, Ngara connived with Muvandi, Muchakazi and Madondo and misrepresented to their superiors that the Defence ministry had received cleaning services from Maids on Wheels (Pvt) Limited.

They allegedly manufactured receipts purporting Maids on Wheels rendered cleaning services on different dates and all the fake invoices added up to $306 135.

The State alleges the trio sourced five fake invoices with a total value of $306 135 and originated minutes dated June 19, 2019 addressed to the finance and human resources director, Muvandi, who is the owner and signatory to the Maids on Wheels bank account.

The accused persons then allegedly attached the five invoices to the minutes with instructions for the payment without attaching the required award-of-tender letter specifying the job done and signed by the chairman of the procurement management unit.

It is alleged on June 20, 2019, the trio then took a payment request form to the chief accountant, who processed the payment.

Investigations revealed that no requisition was raised by the procurement management unit for cleaning services and there was no tender awarded to Maids on Wheels.

BY MOSES MATENGA

THE MDC has claimed that State security agents have been rattled by party leader Nelson Chamisa’s address on Tuesday and have activated their machinery to silence the opposition countrywide.

MDC deputy spokesperson Luke Tamborinyoka alleged that the party had it on good authority that President Emmerson Mnangagwa’s government had put in motion a campaign targeting MDC officials and supporters.

“As despondent Zimbabweans brace for action to consign poverty and end their suffering, the Mnangagwa regime is planning to engage in nationwide terror tactics and abductions in a vain attempt to cow and intimidate a determined people,” he said, citing alleged impeccable sources within the Joint Operations Command (JOC) in Harare.

“President Chamisa’s call for nationwide action has shaken the regime to the core. The regime is now planning violence, night abductions and an assortment of terror tactics against innocent Zimbabweans in a vain attempt to stop an idea whose time has come.

“The regime has now fallen into its default mode of violence. Impeccable sources said the meeting held by JOC early this week had put in place elaborate plans to abduct and torture MDC leaders and party youths in the various townships in Harare so as to engender fear in the country in a desperate bid to stop Zimbabweans from engaging in peaceful action to express their displeasure at the parlous economic situation.”

Tamborinyoka said intimidation and terror tactics would not work.

Chamisa addressed his party supporters on Tuesday, where he called for action and also real dialogue between his party and Zanu PF, including the military.

Information permanent secretary Ndavaningi Mangwana laughed off the MDC claims.

“Firstly, government does not plot any acts of terror against anyone. Our role is to protect those who operate legally within our borders,” he said.

“The MDC Alliance is an entity that has a legal right to operate in Zimbabwe without breaking the law. So they will be protected by the State.

“But some of their utterances and claims, like this particular one, reflect delusions of persecution and an exaggerated sense of self-importance. After Mr Chamisa’s forgettable speech to a paltry crowd, one can understand these attention-hogging efforts to draw some kind of traction from what proved to be a damp squib of an event.”

There was violence in Mbare on Wednesday as youths from Zanu PF and MDC fought for turf in one of the country’s most populous high-density suburbs.

Zanu PF claimed three of its party supporters were injured, while three MDC supporters were reportedly arrested.

According to the Zimbabwe Lawyers for Human Rights (ZLHR), the three who were arrested are Jonathan Taiziwei (25), Cleopas Chinodya (32), who both reside at Nenyere Flats, and Elia Mutsindi (28) of Budiriro high-density suburb.

ZLHR said the three were charged with assault.

“ZRP officers alleged that Taiziwei, Chinodya and Mutsindi, who are informal traders operating in Mbare, assaulted some Zanu PF supporters, who were clad in the ruling party’s regalia after they visited their stall, where they operate from claiming to be conducting a clean-up exercise in the high-density suburb,” the lawyers said.

MDC chairperson for Harare province, Wellington Chikombo called on his counterpart, Oliver Chidawu, the acting chairman for Zanu PF in the capital, to call for peace and rein in his youth.

“Thuggocracy and tomfoolery in Zanu PF has reached celestial levels. I implore on my counterpart to stop his unemployed and unemployable from charging like bulls in a China shop,” Chikombo said.

“I urge him as my brother to stand up for tolerance, moderation and respect for others.
Exclusionary politics will lead us to chaos and violence. Our tolerance is what makes Harare.”

BY CHARLES LAITON

VICE-PRESIDENT Constantino Chiwenga has been ordered by the High Court to allow his estranged wife, Marry, to access the couple’s Borrowdale matrimonial home after castigating his use of the military to settle a matrimonial dispute.

The ruling against the VP came about after Marry was denied access to number 614 Nick Prince Drive, Borrowdale Brooke, Harare, and her children taken away from her soon after she was released from prison on $50 000 bail following her detention on charges of externalisation, attempted murder and money-laundering.

Soon after being released from prison, Marry arrived home on January 6, 2020 only to discover that her residence had been cordoned by the military, which denied her access to the property.

High Court judge Justice Christopher Dube-Banda, however, castigated the move taken by the VP, saying he ought to have respected the rule of law rather than taking the law into his own hands.
“To my mind, she may move out of such a home either by her consent or after the conclusion of the due process. She cannot be refused entrance to the matrimonial home by the members of the military. In fact, it is unacceptable and anathema to the constitutional values of this jurisdiction that the military may be used to settle a matrimonial dispute,” Justice Dube-Banda said.

“This is frightening and undermines the values inherent in our Constitution, which are the rule of law, supremacy of the Constitution, gender equality, fundamental human rights and freedoms and good governance … I find that applicant had discharged the onus on her of showing, on balance of probabilities, that an act of spoliation was committed against her in respect of number 614 Nick Prince Drive, Borrowdale Brooke, Harare. She has shown a real right, entitling her to find a final order of spoliation.”

Chiwenga argued that he could not allow Marry to reside at their Borrowdale Brooke mansion given that she allegedly attempted to kill him and also that the house has a sentimental value to him.

But Justice Dube-Banda ruled in Marry’s favour, saying Chiwenga had flouted the law.

“To ascertain whether spoliation has occurred, it is irrelevant in this inquiry in whose name the property is registered. The fact that applicant (Marry) was in prison from December 14, 2019 to January 6, 2020 does not take away the fact that she was unlawfully dispossessed of the property.
It is not necessary for the applicant to show continuous physical presence at the property. As long as she proves intention of securing a benefit from the property, it is sufficient,” he said.

“… My view is that an act of spoliation was committed against the applicant on January 6, 2020 when she was denied or refused entry into the property. Respondent (Chiwenga) has no defence to this act of spoliation. The property might be registered in his name, it might be of sentimental value to him, and might have no other home. However, all these do not amount to a defence in a case of spoliation. Mandament van spolie is a possessory remedy. Ownership does not come into the enquiry.”

Justice Dube-Banda noted said section 74 of the Constitution provides that no person may be evicted from their home without an order of the court made after considering all the relevant circumstances.

“What happened to the applicant must be a cause of fear and concern to all law-abiding citizens, wherever they are and their station life. It is in such situations that this court must step in, without fear or favour, to defend the Constitution and to defend the rule of law. There cannot be, in a constitutional democracy, a law for the powerful and a law for the weak. It is in such instances that this court must stand firm and apply the law without fear or favour,” the Judge said.

Turning to the issue of custody of the three minor children, the judge said Chiwenga had no right to seize the minors from their mother without following the due process of the law.

“… in terms of the rule of law, government and its officials and agents as well as individuals and private persons are accountable under the same law. The rule of law expresses the principle that all people are equal under the law, no one is above the law, and no one is below it. The courts exist to ensure that everyone is accountable to the law. The role of the courts is to protect the rights and freedoms guaranteed under the Constitution. When an individual can show that his or her rights have been violated, the courts will provide a remedy. Everyone, whatever his or her rank, is subject to the law,” he said, ordering Chiwenga to release the three minors to their mother within 24 hours of the court order.

“In the result, I order as follows: the respondent (Chiwenga) is, hereby, ordered to restore the custody of the minor children (names withheld) to the applicant within 24 hours of this order.”

The court also interdicted Chiwenga from barring Marry to access her business at Orchid Gardens in Domboshava, about 30km north of Harare, accessing or possessing her clothes and further interdicted him from barring Marry from using all the vehicles she claimed the VP had seized from her.

“The respondent is, hereby, interdicted and restrained from interfering with applicant’s access to, use and enjoyment of the property known as Orchid Gardens, Domboshava, Harare. The respondent is, hereby, interdicted and restrained from interfering with applicant’s access to, use and enjoyment of the motor vehicles, namely Toyota Lexus, Mercedes-Benz S400, and Mercedes-Benz E350 (black).”

Chiwenga has since lodged an appeal to the Supreme Court.

By Business Reporter

CBZ Insurance has reintroduced its international travel insurance set to benefit policy holders on matters of personal safety, baggage damage and other unforeseen financial losses going away for trips.

The programme covers business or recreational travellers.

Under the insurance initiative, CBZ Insurance undertakes to ensure those covered receive immediate and direct assistance right at the time one encounters a problem.

What the Travel Insurance covers shall depend on one’s budget, type of trip, activities while one is abroad, their destination as well as trip duration.

The cover includes International Medical and Hospitalisation expenses, Medical Evacuation, Repatriation expenses in case of death as well as compensation for luggage incidents.

In terms of baggage, the travel insurance programme covers loss of passport, driving license, national id card abroad.

In the case of flights, compensation shall be payable upon loss of checked-in baggage, delay in luggage arrival of luggage well as location and forwarding of baggage and personal belongings.

The programme cover shall exclude those with pre-existing and chronic conditions, one engaging in dangerous-considered sports and any kind of professional sport practices.

Among activities excluded from the travel insurance cover are manual labour related activities involving working with one’s hands using both mechanical and non-mechanical devices.

Also excluded are services contracted without the previous authorisation of the assistance operators, fragile baggage or electronic items carried in the checked-in baggage, acts of Go, pregnancy and accidents due alcohol abuse.

Insurance benefits will ensure you are compensated after your trip ends.

Meanwhile, assistance services will ensure you receive immediate and direct assistance at the moment the problem arises.

Many investors need equity returns to build wealth over the long term. Unfortunately sometimes investors find it difficult to endure the sharp declines and volatility that is often experienced in the capital markets. As an investor, one should understand that risk is necessary to pursue higher returns. However, the correlation between risk and reward illustrates that higher returns, more often than not, experience higher volatility. This leads to the important subject of how to react in a turbulent environment.

For an investor safety is as important as growth. Prudent risk management therefore requires that one addresses the possibility that a “Bull” market could turn “Bearish” at any time. One’s portfolio needs to be
prepared should unfriendly market conditions occur. During turbulent times in stock markets investors are looking for answers about what they should do. The answers however, depend upon just who is asking the questions. If the questioner is a speculator who buys and sells stock with the focus on their momentary prices then it may be difficult to offer a solution as successful market timing is near impossible. If on the other hand, the question is coming from a long term investor, there are quite a number of ways to prepare for turbulent times.

It’s important not to let market uncertainties affect financial planning for the years ahead. Individuals who stop their investment planning, particularly during market downturns, can often miss out on opportunities to invest at lower prices. Nobody has all the answers to why the market takes a nosedive, but it’s often useful to take a look at the economic precursors that may play a role in market turbulence.

Uncertainty is a constant, and downturns happen frequently. But market setbacks have typically been followed by recoveries. An investor should stay disciplined as trying to time the market has proven challenging and costly. An investing approach built with one’s goals and situation in mind may help one cope with short-term volatility. Instead of being worried by volatility, be prepared. A well-defined investing plan tailored to one’s goals and financial situation can help one be ready for the normal ups and downs of the market, and to take advantage of opportunities as they arise.

Attempting to move in and out of the market can be costly and the decisions investors make about when to buy and sell can cause investors to perform worse than they would have, had the investors simply bought and held the same investments. If one invests regularly over months, years, and decades, short-term downturns will not have much of an impact on the ultimate performance.

If one keeps investing through downturns, it won’t guarantee gains or that they will never experience a loss, but when prices do fall, they may actually benefit in the long run. When the market drops, the prices of investments fall and the regular contributions allow one to buy a larger number of shares.

Finally, if the movement of the markets have changed your mix of large-cap, small-cap or the mix of stocks, may need a rebalance to get back to the target asset mix. That could provide a disciplined approach that helps one take advantage of lower prices.

Rather than focusing on the turbulence, wondering whether you need to do something now or wondering what the market will do tomorrow, it makes more sense to focus on developing and maintaining a sound investing plan. A good plan can help you ride out the peaks and valleys of the market and may help you achieve your financial goals. You can battle quick sand with quick thinking.

These strategies can be complex, and you may want to consult a professional before making any investment decisions.