HOPEWELL CHIN’ONO ALLEGATIONS THAT CHAMISA BLOCKED BITI AND SIKHALA: FACT CHECK
Veteran former MP Rusty Markham has laid to rest allegations by Hopewell Chin’ono @daddyhope that suggest he was imposed by party leader NelsonChamisa to replace Tendai Biti in the 2023 elections. Chin’ono claims Chamisa blocked Biti and Job Sikhala @JobSikhala1’s careers.
Rusty Markham’s response is confirmed by several videos that suggest that it is Chin’ono himself who has used the journalism tag to shipwreck not just the two MPs, but the entire civil society which he has repeatedly accused of corruption with western embassies, and accused it of causing tension with the Ministry of Defence since 2018-2024.
In his response Markham states that he has never been ordered to what Chin’ono alleges (see screenprint).
“I was never told not to contest against @BitiTendai and not to retire by anyone,” he writes.
“I am my own man and my principles do not get swayed,” he concludes.
@daddyhope has failed to respond.
Meanwhile, Chin’ono has other controversies, lingering-
- He accuses the Opposition of blocking his Govt In Exile Clinic in Aug 2024, saying he was about to use his £3 million-wealth to fund treatments for elderly citizens, yet he can’t pay a paltry $15,000 for his former employer Geoff Nyarota’s surgery, who’s only later rescued by Wicknell Chivayo.
- He fails to respond to evidence by Rusty Markham that the latter was never instructed by Chamisa or anyone to block Biti.
- He (Chin’ono) himself was captured on a recording with Tafadzwa Musekiwa at Thomas Mapfumo’s show in July 2022, personally crashing Job Sikhala’s career with gossip feeding a fake Nelson-Mandela persecution ego that suggests Chamisa is the one causing his (Job’s) suffering.
- It is Chin’ono himself who’s crashed the entire opposition’s career by advising the Defence Ministry to regularly descend on it to reduce tension in the period 2018-2024.
- It is Chin’ono himself who has celebrated the crashing of the opposition after these deployments, repeatedly saying the opposition are now corrupted such that they will now “do nothing other than tweet.”
- It is Chin’ono himself who’s been cited many times for using the journalism tag to silence freedom of expression.
- Chin’ono stands accused as a Daddy character, a manipulator, who only rose to prominence on a lie that one of the first whistleblowers accusing him over grooming, and cheque fraud allegations, an NHS expert and former ZimEye presenter, Grace Mupfurutsa, was sent by the Mnangagwa regime to a media outlet called Gambakwe in Aug 2020, something that as is clear, never happened.