Chairman of the Parliamentary Portfolio Committee on Mines and Energy, Temba Mliswa has said the Parliament will write to the former leader of Zimbabwe to appear on Monday after the country’s longest serving President Robert Mugabe post independence could not appear before parliament today.
The former President Robert Mugabe had been invited to appear before the Committee at 9:00am to brief the committee following a statement that Zimbabwe had lost US $15 billion in diamond revenue.
“In view of the time, we have resolved that we will write to the former President His Excellency Comrade (Cde) R. G. Mugabe to appear before us on Monday at 2:00,” Mliswa said.
“Committee also is cognisant of the fact that 9:00 was, a bit too early to ask the former President to be here as you will also appreciate that when he was in office, he would start cabinet at 12:00.”
Mliswa said that the parliamentary committee is not there to humiliate Mr Mugabe.
“We expect him to have enough time to prepare,” the Norton Member of Parliament said.
“We don’t expect not to get any cooperation from him. Parliament has the power to summon anyone and I don’t think we would want to do that.”
Mr Mugabe revealed that the country received less than US$2 billion and yet over US$15 billion could have been earned from Marange mining during his 92nd birthday.
The Portfolio Committee has in the past called former Ministers and Security bosses following allegations of the US$15 billion loss.
“We’re not saying that they are guilty, but we would like to find out whether they knew about the concessions and who was running the concessions because all this information is very necessary,” Mliswa was quoted in a local media outlet.
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