Pretoria - In a shock move Zimbabwean President Emmerson Mnangagwa has fired his State Security Minister and hitherto ally Owen Mudha Ncube.
In a statement, Dr Misheck Sibanda, Chief Secretary to the President and Cabinet, said Mnangagwa had removed Ncube “with immediate effect for conduct inappropriate for a minister of government.”
“His Excellency the President of the Republic of Zimbabwe Cde ED Mnangagwa, has in terms of section 340, subsection (1), paragraph (f), as read with section 104, subsection (1) of (1) of the Constitution of Zimbabwe removed Owen Ncube from Office of Cabinet Minister and Minister of Government with immediate effect for conduct inappropriate for a Minister of Government,” the statement read.
Ncube was in charge of Zimbabwe’s dreaded intelligence agency, the Central Intelligence Organisation (CIO).
Online publication NewZimbabwe.com reported that Mnangagwa fired Ncube because the minister had defied the president’s orders to refrain from jostling for a Zanu-PF leadership position in the Midlands province.
The publication also reported that Mnangagwa had become frustrated by Ncube’s ‘violent tendencies’.
Ncube,who was appointed to the influential ministerial post in September 2018, was widely seen as a close lieutenant of Mnangagwa.
In 2019, Ncube was placed on the United States Department of the Treasury's Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) for alleged human rights abuses, linked to a crackdown on protests and the opposition in Zimbabwe.
Ncube becomes the fifth minister to be fired by Mnangagwa since 2018. The others were Prisca Mupfumira, Energy Mutodi, Fortune Chasi and Obadiah Moyo.
IOL