Budiriro Needed Water. Why Did Its MP Need a Fortuner?

If the borehole breaks tomorrow, the people of Budiriro North will need their MP to ask who was paid to maintain it and when the water will run again. Susan Matsunga should be able to ask those questions as sharply as she praised President Emmerson Mnangagwa when the boreholes were unveiled. That is why the Toyota Fortuner matters. The trouble began when Wicknell Chivayo decided that an opposition MP who thanked the President for a public service had earned a private reward.

Chivayo’s April announcement made a distinction worth remembering. The US$50,000 was for community projects benefiting women and young people in Budiriro North. The Fortuner was for Matsunga. He made the offer conditional on her agreement and her party’s approval, denied trying to recruit her and added that ZANU PF would welcome her if she chose to join. When acceptance was subsequently reported, Tshabangu’s spokesman said the decision belonged to the individual member’s conscience. The donor had invited the party to exercise judgment. The party declined.

Put yourself in the shoes of a woman in Budiriro who runs a market stall and heard that some of that US$50,000 was intended for women like her. Whom does she ask about it? The MP, because the offer came through her? The party, which says it was a personal matter? She is entitled to know whether the money arrived, who chose the projects and where she can see the accounts. None of that requires her to begrudge her MP a comfortable car. It requires somebody to remember that Chivayo invoked her community’s name when he announced the money.

In October, Sengezo Tshabangu reportedly appointed Matsunga interim national organiser of the CCC, with Evans Ndaba as her deputy. Party insiders complained that members had no vote on either appointment. The promotion alone proves nothing about Chivayo’s influence. It does, however, give CCC members reason to ask what standard their new organiser will apply when the next candidate is offered an expensive favour by somebody close to the government. Will the party leave that decision to personal conscience too?

Some of those members are already asking a harder question about their own money. In a letter reported by 263Chat, party members said the national finance committee had never met to oversee the distribution of an April 2025 public funding allocation they valued at roughly US$1.4 million. They asked what had been spent and what had reached the provinces and districts. Their allegation concerns oversight. Tshabangu could answer it with accounts, dates and the names of those who approved the spending. An opposition party that wants to examine Treasury’s books should understand why its members want to examine theirs.

ZANU PF can gain a great deal from this arrangement without directing a single CCC appointment. The President gets thanked for the water. His wealthy supporter gets to set the price of that gratitude. The opposition leadership calls the gift a personal affair, and the resident who needs her MP to challenge the government is left wondering how freely her representative can speak.

Matsunga can answer that resident. She can publish what became of the community money, explain on whose authority she took the organising post and tell Budiriro what she will do when the government deserves criticism. I would welcome those answers. The people who sent her to Parliament should never have to wonder whether their votes bought them less access to their own MP than one businessman could get with a set of car keys.