By Paul Nyathi| President Emmerson Mnangagwa has asked the nation to start calling him “Mr Ground Breaking” following his numerous obviously window dressing ground breaking ceremonies ahead of the upcoming national elections.
Addressing people gathered to witness the commissioning of the African Chrome Fields chrome processing plant owned by the Moti Group outside Kwekwe on Wednesday, President Mnangagwa said he wanted to adopt the new nickname after presiding over several ground breaking ceremonies since taking over government from Robert Mugabe in November last year.
“I am now Mr Groundbreaking,” President Mnangagwa said to applause from the crowd.
“But you realise that each incident where we are commissioning or doing groundbreaking, that is creation of employment; that is putting food at the table of our families. This is the new Zimbabwe we want. We shall continue to grow and grow. Today’s event is a great accomplishment,” he said.
Mnangagwa has kept himself very busy presiding at almost every little development in the country’s industrial sector in a bid to want to promote his struggling government.
The only major projects that Mnangagwa presided over were the recent commissioning of the Hwange 7 and 8 thermal projects which were started years back by the Mugabe government.
On Monday he officiated at the groundbreaking ceremony of the US$153 million expansion of Robert Gabriel Mugabe International Airport and on Tuesday he was in Mhondoro-Mubaira where he officially launched the US$4,2 billion Karo Resources consolidated platinum project.
“We had the recent groundbreaking of Hwange 7 and 8 thermal power projects. The upgrade and modernisation of Beitbridge Border Post, Robert Gabriel Mugabe International Airport development projects as well as the commissioning of the newly refurbished Kadoma General Hospital and Delta in Harare. I can go on and on,” Mnangagwa said.
Mnangagwa made reference to several foreign direct investments promises that have been made to him provided he complied to some stringent conditions top of which is to provide the country with a free, fair and credible election set for next Monday.
“Investment commitments that have been given by foreign investment in the country range beyond US$16 billion,” he said.
“In the past we never reached US$500 million per year but under six months we are exceeding $16 billion. We are saying Zimbabwe shall never be the same again. In Zimbabwe we preach peace, we preach unity and we preach tolerance. We want our people to be united, we want our people to support each other and we want our people to be respectful. We continue to march on in pursuit of our vision to become a middle income economy by 2030.”
President Mnangagwa commended the Moti Group for taking a bold decision to invest in Zimbabwe at a time some companies were scaling down or exiting the country.