MUGABE BATHS IN COLD WATER

Zimbabwe‘s President Robert Mugabe confessed to his supporters that he had had a cold bath yesterday morning as the country sank deeper into an economic quagmire.

He told about 3 000 ZANU PF supporters at a rally in Chitungwiza township, just outside Harare, that shortages in the country affected even the president’s residence.

Ahead of next Saturday’s elections, Mugabe was trying to reassure and console his supporters, who faced daily economic woes such as food shortages, potholes in the roads, no water and power cuts.

“Last night [Friday] when I came back from Zvimba [his home village], there was no hot water in my home.

“I said to myself, ‘I am a man’ and I used cold water they fetched for me in buckets. This morning, they tried to boil water for me, but I am used to the showers in the prison. I have a cold bath again.

“Water shortage is a problem. My minister said they could not distribute water because they don’t have money for purification chemicals and they were waiting for the cabinet. I said ‘Why wait for the cabinet?’ They want [the cabinet to allocate] foreign currency to import these chemicals from South Africa,” he said in a one-hour speech, speaking mostly in Shona.

At rallies throughout this week, Mugabe warned business against food-price increases, invoking party heroes to portray ZANU PF as the only organisation that sacrificed for freedom and promising to deliver government services.

On Saturday, he said that the district development fund would repair rural roads, but city roads are badly scarred with potholes.

He said the electricity problem was affecting the region, including South Africa, and that he would build power stations and distribute generators after the elections.

He threatened companies that increased food prices, charging that this was a political ploy to “influence people to vote for [the Movement for Democratic Change] MDC” and blame ZANU PF for all the mess.

“Drop those prices to the level they were at. If you don’t, I’ll do it for you. They will not be prices dropping, but you will be dropping,” he said – in English.

He blamed rain for the food shortages.

He reiterated his invective against Simba Makoni, the former ZANU PF politburo member now a independent presidential candidate, calling him a sellout and a prostitute without a political party.

“Sellouts will never win elections in Zimbabwe,” he said.

He was applauded for his attacks on the MDC, Britain and Tony Blair, the former British prime minister.

(Source)