Staff ReporterHARARE – The Zanu PF government has yet again been thrown into chaos after the ministries of Public Service and Finance cut loose thousands of national youth service workers apparently without the approval of President Robert Mugabe who has now ordered their reinstatement.
This is not the first time Mugabe has contradicted his ministers, with Finance minister Patrick Chinamasa having been embarrassed on several occasions on the issue of paying civil servants bonuses.
As part of its austerity measures, government has terminated contracts of the youths — mostly drawn from the controversial national youth service (green bombers) — who worked as youth officers across the country and were used by the ruling party in previous elections to coerce villagers to vote for Mugabe.
Speaking at a youths interface rally in Chinhoyi yesterday Mugabe, who was obviously charmed by the huge numbers that teemed to the event on a wintry day and heaped praises on the party’s secretary for youth, Kudzanai Chipanga, said his Cabinet never okayed the termination of the youths’ contracts.
“You are doing this good work and I hear that some youths who were working for government have been fired but we never heard about that.
“Our economy is recovering, is that the time we should be dismissing our youths? How can they say we have no money now . . . please reinstate those youths, we never, never agreed on that.
“The issue of firing those youths was never agreed. Where is the ministry of Finance and Labour, please stop it,” said Mugabe.
The Daily News on Sunday can report that thousands of government workers, including those from the ministry of Women’s Affairs, have not been paid their monies after their contracts were terminated and this has seen tensions rising between the ministry of Youth and those of Finance and Public Service.
Most of those who were affected include youth and gender officers who for the most part are idle and only serve as extensions of the ruling party’s commissariat department.
Also affected in the recent exercise that has yet again divided Mugabe’s Cabinet are ghost workers who have been receiving salaries even though they are not contributing anything to the civil service.
