Coronavirus in Zim: Zanu PF bigwig Obert Mpofu goes into quarantine

Zanu PF Secretary for Administration, Obert Mpofu has gone into quarantine after he recently returned from Tanzania, CITE can reveal.

Quarantine is for returnees from high-risk countries and such a measure is crucial to prevent the spread of Covid-19.

Zimbabwe has a 21-day mandatory quarantine for returning residents and visitors, with testing supposed to be done on Day One, Day Eight and Day 21.

But the country faces challenges in testing, which results in some returnees staying more than the required days, as they can only be released and cleared after being issued a Covid-19 certificate.

In an interview with CITE, Mpofu, 69, said he had been in quarantine since last week.

“I am in quarantine as we speak. I recently came back from Tanzania and will be in quarantine until the eighth day (for the second round of tests),” he said.

Mpofu noted that on the way to Tanzania he went through a rigorous process to be cleared and endured the same procedure when he came back to Zimbabwe.

“After the rigorous screening I am now actually waiting for Day Eight, after which I will be re tested,” said the Zanu-PF official.

Mpofu noted he was following the prescribed guidelines carefully, highlighting that due his age, he could be vulnerable to Covid-19.

“Covid-19 is unfriendly to us senior people, that is why I have to be careful,” he said.

His last portfolio in government was in September 2018, when Mpofu served as Minister of Home Affairs from 2017.

Previously he was Minister of Macro-Economic Planning and Investment Promotion; Minister of Industry and International Trade; Minister of Mines and Mining Development; and Minister of Transport and Infrastructure Development.

When the Cabinet was dissolved on November 27, 2017, he was reappointed as Minister of Home Affairs in President Emmerson Mnangagwa’s first cabinet on 30 November 2017.

Mpofu was later removed from the Zimbabwe cabinet in September 2018 to serve as Zanu-PF’s Secretary for Administration.

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