ZANU PF Acting Spokesperson labels Journalist ‘British Mouthpiece’ for questioning a ‘FAKE’ British letter

Zimbabwe’s ruling party ZANU PF Acting Spokesperson Patrick Chinamasa has labelled Alpha Media Holdings journalist Blessed Mhlanga a British Spokesperson after he questioned the authenticity of a document alleged to have been authored by British government through its Defence Ministry.

By Tongai Mwenje

The former Finance Minister said this while addressing members of the media fraternity at the party’s headquarters in Harare.

“The MDC was founded and has been nurtured financially, morally and diplomatically by the British government. Declassified documents (support our allegations),” he said handing the document to the party’s communication director Tafadzwa Mugwadi.

“This refers to a meeting at that time going back to 2001 between, the High Commissioner (Brian Donnelly) was here, who met the MDC, Messrs Morgan Tsvangirai, Tendai Laxton Biti and David Coltart who were asking for funding and this minute which now has been declassified shows that the British government committed itself to making more resources available to MDC inorder to fight ZANU PF and president Mugabe ( at the material time) with a view to reverse the land reform programme,” he said trying to clear his previous statement which he alleged were wrongly quoted by some members of the media fraternity.

Mhlanga, who has become one of the few local journalists with courage to interrogate public figures asked on the authenticity of the document produced by Chinamasa during his press briefing.

The document accuses the British government of being the chief funder of local opposition, MDC.

“The British actually said that this was a fake letter, and if you look at the letter itself it puts the Ministry of Defence Whitehall London and it has an address of 10 Downing Street which is not the same place and the Ministry of Defence is not stationed at number 10 Downing Street,” Mhlanga queried Chinamasa.

Instead of clearing the air on the authenticity of the document, Chinamasa went on to accuse the journalist of being an unofficial British mouthpiece in Zimbabwe.

” You don’t understand the intelligence of the United Kingdom, you don’t understand it,” he said with much emphasis.

“I am sure you know there is MI50 ( MI5 British intelligence agency)? Where does it operate from? Tell me,” he asked the journalist to which he said he was not aware but certainly not number 10 Downing Street.

Chinamasa, who served in the government of Zimbabwe as the minister of various cabinet ministries then said, ” Thank you very much. Anyway i am very happy to know now that you represent the British. That you are their spokesperson in Zimbabwe. Its very clear that you are their spokesperson.”

10 Downing Street, also known colloquially in the United Kingdom as Number 10, is the headquarters of the Government of the United Kingdom and the official residence and office of the First Lord of the Treasury, a post which, for much of the 18th and 19th centuries and invariably since 1905, has been held by the Prime Minister of the United Kingdom. The term “10 Downing Street”, or just “Downing Street”, is also used to mean “the Prime Minister’s office”.