Deputy Information minister Energy Mutodi told the Daily News that the doctors are actually the ones who asked to meet with the first lady Auxillia Mnangagwa in order for her to assist in the impasse.
Mutodi’s comment comes after President Emmerson Mnangagwa is facing allegations of allowing his wife Auxillia “to usurp constitutional power”. Auxillia met with doctors at State House on Friday, in a bid to end the five week-long industrial action. While Auxilia was meeting with the doctors, her husband was taking part in a clean-up campaign in Harare’s red-light district of the Avenues. Citizens and political analysts questioned in what capacity she met striking doctors when she has no constitutional role in the State bureaucracy. Said Mutodi:
The First Lady did not poke her nose into the doctors’ strike issue. Rather it is the doctors themselves who canvassed for her attention and as a mother of the nation she could not ignore them. The doctors believed she was the right person through which to air their grievances to the president and as the government we do not see anything untoward in her conduct especially listening to professionals whose strike action can trigger many avoidable deaths.
However, a doctor who declined to be named said it was in fact the first lady who requested the meeting.