By Cde Nhamo Taneta
When military tanks rolled into the streets of Harare on 17 November 2017, the late Sibusiso Moyo told us with a straight face that “Operation Restore Legacy” was targeting criminals surrounding Robert Mugabe.
Eight years later, it is déjà vu under President Emmerson Mnangagwa — only this time, the criminals don’t surround him.
They run him.
Mnangagwa promised a “New Dispensation,” but what we got is the same old sadza, just reheated.
Mugabe’s cronies were replaced by a greedier, flashier crop of tenderpreneurs who loot openly, flaunt their ill-gotten wealth on social media, and bankroll ZANU PF while ordinary citizens hustle for cooking oil and maize meal.
Enter Wicknell Chivhayo, Kudakwashe Tagwirei, Delish Nguwaya, Tempter Paul Tungwarara, and Scott Sakupwanya — the so-called Zvigananda.
They are not criminals “around” the president.
They are the “New Cabinet.”
Chivhayo, the self-styled “King of Tenders,” is Exhibit A.
In 2015, his company Intratrek pocketed US$5 million for the Gwanda solar project that today looks like a grazing field for goats.
No megawatts, just weeds, termites and a lonely security guard.
Yet the same Chivhayo struts around handing out luxury cars and US$1 million to ZANU PF chairpersons — a bribe thinly disguised as philanthropy.
His leaked boast, ndakachibata kuti dzvii, was not a joke.
It was his State of the Nation Address — Wicknell style.
Tagwirei, is of course the regime’s ATM.
Through Sakunda Holdings and its murky shareholding allegedly held by Mnangagwa, Kembo Mohadi and Patrick Chinamasa, he reportedly siphoned US$3.2 billion.
Money that should have built schools, hospitals and roads instead bought loyalty, distributed via Chivhayo, Sakupwanya and Nguwaya.
Even Vice-President Constantino Chiwenga has cried foul.
Imagine your own deputy begging you to arrest your cash cow — it’s painful, eh.
Tungwarara also makes sure his name is in the scandal hall of fame.
He turned the Presidential Borehole Scheme into a money-making well, charging three times the market rate per borehole.
His so-called Presidential Solar Programme in Glen View sparked lawsuits after residents’ land was grabbed without consent.
Just like Chivhayo’s Gwanda deal, Tungwarara’s projects promise light but deliver blackout.
Then there’s Delish Nguwaya, “Mr Untouchable.”
He made a killing during Covid-19 with overpriced PPE, and now he’s milking Harare residents through the US$3 million-a-month Pomona waste deal.
Citizens pay while rubbish piles up.
Nguwaya’s genius?
Turning garbage into gold — for himself.
And of course, Scott Sakupwanya, the gold kingpin.
The Al Jazeera exposé showed how his Better Brands became a conduit for smuggling gold worth hundreds of millions.
Instead of being in jail, he bankrolls ZANU PF campaigns.
In this New Dispensation, crime doesn’t pay — it invests, then gets Cabinet access.
All this thrives because watchdogs are on leashes.
Regulators look away, parliament rubber-stamps, and anti-corruption bodies act like bouncers for the connected.
What began as a promise to cleanse Zimbabwe of Mugabe’s cronies has morphed into a brazen system of state capture.
Operation Restore Legacy promised salvation. Mnangagwa has delivered Operation Repeat History — new faces, same rot, and a presidency run not by leaders, but by tenderpreneurs.
Indeed, this is a New Dispensation — of criminals, for criminals, by criminals.
Editor’s Note: In the spirit of patriotism, ZANU PF would like to assure citizens that the looting will continue until morale improves. Pasi ne transparency, pasi ne accountability!
