Delegates will eat 54 cows and up to five tonnes of game meat at President Robert Mugabe’s 92nd birthday party on Saturday, the official Herald newspaper reported.
Up to 50,000 supporters of the longtime Zimbabwe president are expected at the party in the southern city of Masvingo, where drought has wrecked crops in surrounding areas.
ZANU-PF provincial political commissar Jappy Jaboon told the Herald on Saturday that the cows and the game meat had been “donated”.
He did not say by whom.
A donation of elephant meat last year to Mugabe’s 91st party in Victoria Falls sparked controversy after it emerged that the businessman who handed over the elephants did not have any right to them.
Mugabe’s own donation of 300 cattle to the African Union has been received with mixed feelings back home where up to 3 million Zimbabweans face hunger. The state ZBC broadcaster says the cows were handed over to the AU commission on Friday.
There is as yet no suggestion that the 54 cattle for the birthday party came from the first family, who own a large dairy in the Mazowe district, north of Harare.
The party is being held near the Great Zimbabwe monument, a ruined city near Lake Mutirikwi that is recognised by UNESCO as a World Heritage Site.
The state-run Chronicle quoted National Museums and Monuments provincial director Lovemore Mandima saying VIPs would be allowed to tour the monument — though not all at the same time.
Media group @263chat tweeted a photo of one of Mugabe’s birthday cakes: a giant replica of the monument with the stonework painstakingly reproduced.
Hundreds of crates of soft drinks and beers have been brought in for party-goers and wifi has been installed, said the Chronicle.
This newspaper put a much lower figure on the game meat that had been donated, saying it weighed 300 kg.
Source – News24
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