Staff ReporterTHE African National Congress secretary general has lodged a formal complaint to Zanu PF asking President Mugabe to stop “telling lies” about South Africa and late former president Nelson Mandela.
This was revealed by ANC secretary general Gwede Mantashe on Tuesday. Mantashe said he told a Zanu PF official in a telephonic conversation asking that Mugabe must stop making “unwarranted and unfortunate attacks” on Mandela’s legacy.
“I phoned the SG of Zanu PF. When SGs talk they are not in a picnic. I did not raise this issue with the SG of Zanu PF formally in my capacity as SG of ANC and not as a friend,” Mantashe said.
This was after Mugabe said Mandela let down black South Africans by choosing personal freedom ahead of the rest of his countrymen’s economic emancipation.
“What was the most important thing for [Mandela] was his release from prison and nothing else. He cherished that freedom more than anything else and forgot why he was put in jail,” Mugabe said in Shona at Zanu PF rally held in Gweru last week.
According to Mantashe, Mugabe has destroyed the Zimbabwean economy.
“The reality of the matter is that you have destroyed the economy of your country,” Mantashe told journalists at Luthuli House.
The ANC boss said the SA economy was creating “black millionaires” who included Zimbabweans.
Mantashe said contrary to Mugabe’s claims that Mandela’s rule had pauperised blacks, research proved the ANC had created a better life for the majority of South Africans.
“This has been done in a responsible manner that has not brought our economy to its knees in pursuit of adventurism and populism,” Mantashe said.
