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Joice Mujuru

Fidelis Munyoro Chief Court Reporter
Zimbabwe People First leader Dr Joice Mujuru has been hit with a $5 million lawsuit by her former allies, Messrs Didymus Mutasa and Rugare Gumbo, over her utterances claiming that the two wanted to mate with her.

The lawsuit was triggered by media reports on Dr Mujuru’s Masvingo rally last week, where she was quoted saying Messrs Mutasa and Gumbo wanted sexual favours from her, which she turned down.

Through their lawyer Mr Gerald Mlotshwa, the two also want the NewsDay, which published the article headlined “Bigwigs wanted to sleep with me”, to make a retraction with a full apology.

In the article, the paper reported that Mujuru accused a group of party elders she expelled of seeking to turn her into a sex slave, after proposing that she be the opposition party’s “queen bee”.

She notably accused Messrs Mutasa and Gumbo of wanting her to sleep with male colleagues in the party, taking advantage of the fact that she was a widow.

“I want you to Google then advise each other. They said Mai Mujuru, we want you to be our queen bee. I was supposed to mate with all the men in the party. I was supposed to be their wife,” she was quoted as saying.

“I was supposed to work for them because they had seen that while I was still in Egypt (zanu-PF) I used to work hard.

“So they wanted to borrow that hard-working spirit to work for them and I told them that I can’t be your queen bee.”

In the article, Dr Mujuru described herself as a woman of substance with an image to protect and that since the death of her husband (Solomon Mujuru), she had lost appetite for men.

In the letter to Dr Mujuru written on February 20, 2017, Mr Mlotshwa said his clients took grave exception to her statements.

“The article quoted your statements uttered during a rally you conducted during the previous weekend in Masvingo,” said Mr Mlotshwa. “You basically accused our clients of trying to persuade you to ‘mate with all the men in the party and that . . . I was supposed to be their wife’, in accordance with the wishes (of) our clients.”

The lawyer said when Dr Mujuru uttered the statements, she was fully aware that his clients had no desire whatsoever for such an activity from her.

“Your words were malicious and deliberately intended to tarnish our clients’ respective reputation and standing,” he said.

The lawyer also advised the NewsDay that if no traction was made by close of business tomorrow they would proceed to sue in the High Court for a combined figure of $5million.