MDC to probe UK officials

LONDON – Members of the suspended provincial executive of the 800 member strong Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) in the United Kingdom and Ireland are waiting to be told when senior party officials from Harare will arrive in London to inspect the books which the MDC Secretary General Tendai Biti fears might have been cooked over the last couple of years.

The MDC is sending a high-powered team to the UK to probe alleged financial irregularities in the handling of fund raised for the 2008 elections.

Reports claim that Morgan Tsvangirais wing of the MDC is disturbed that UK officials are responsible for creating an embarrassing financial corruption scandal with the possibility that as much as 57,000 has gone missing, a suggestion strongly denied by Tendai Gonesso, treasurer of the suspended MDC(UK) executive.

The suspension was announced by Biti through a letter dated 17 November but the story broke in the mainstream British press only on 31 December 2009.

A report in The Independent written by Alex Duval Smith in Harare and Archie Bland said that MDC (UK) officials were playing down the claims that large sums of money have gone missing.

Its more to do with the way the money was remitted from Harare, Jeff Sango, chairman of the MDC in south-east England was quoted as saying. The people who were supposed to make the investigation should come here and do the investigation. There is no evidence right now. It is only an allegation.

Gonesso was later quoted saying there were no irregularities in a financial report submitted to the MDC in Harare. I am one hundred percent confident that we will be cleared. The matter is political rather than financial.

The official spokesman for the MDC (UK) Matthew Nyashnu told AFNS from his home in the English Midlands: We fully respect the position that has been taken by the MDC and we will wait until such a time that they have investigated fully and come out with a completion report before making a statement.

Reports quoted MDC spokesman Nelson Chamisa saying that the investigation team that will fly to London will include National Chairman, Lovemore Moyo who is also Speaker of the National assembly and the MDCs deputy treasurer Elton Mangoma.

In recent weeks, Morgan Tsvangirai has gone to great lengths to underscore the need for transparency within the MDC.

Agency reports quoted Gonesso saying that he was shocked by the MDC decision to suspend the UK executive. In fact, he said, I am surprised because I presented accounts which were audited according to international standards. But some party members sent some allegations on abuse of funds. The leadership acted on those allegations by rebels and not my report.

He said that the MDC had 40 branches with a total of around 800 active members and that about 70 percent of the funds raised through membership, subscriptions and fund-raising events were sent to Zimbabwe.

It costs 70 to join the MDC in Britain and monthly subscriptions are 5 a month. In suspending the executive, Biti said that with immediate effect MDC members in the UK were prohibited from engaging in any party activities or representing the party in the UKL/Ireland province in any capacity.

Said Gonesso: I am prepared to co-operate fully with the investigators. I am responsible for finance. I however feel sorry for my colleagues who have been caught up and have nothing to do with funds. In the end, we do not want to tarnish the name of the party and the struggle.

Meanwhile, reports claim that lawyers representing the Girl Child Network Trust Fund in Britain have asked the Zimbabwean based organisations co-founder Betty Makoni to step down as president while British police look into allegations that funds raised for an ailing Zimbabwean girl went astray.

Sources told the VOA that the board of trustees of the Girl Child Trust recently met in the UK and resolved to ask Ms Makoni to step down pending the outcome of the police investigations. – African Forum News Services