The Sunday News
THE Government has successfully vetted more than 700 000 war collaborators and ex-detainees from the estimated total of over a million for the purposes of compensation, a Minister said.
Addressing Zimbabwe Liberation War Collaborators national conference at Mucheke Stadium last week, Deputy Minister of Welfare Services for War Veterans, War Collaborators, Political Detainees and Restrictees Retired Colonel Tshinga Dube said his ministry will not be able to meet the December deadline to complete the vetting exercise because of the shortage of financial resources, adding that at least $4 million was needed to complete the exercise.
He said in the wake of lack of financial resources, his ministry has revised the deadline to March next year given that treasury is yet to release funds. He appealed to war collaborators to be patient until Government raises the required funding to complete the exercise which will see a number of war collaborators and ex-detainees benefitting from Government programmes together with their counterparts — the war veterans.
“We have so far vetted more than 700 000 collaborators and ex-detainees but we look forward to have the figure rise to more than one million. We still need to vet more than 300 000 more but we need at least,
$4 million to do that. The exercise is done for the purposes of compensation,” said Rtd Col Dube.
Rtd Col Dube said as soon as the money is released the process would be expedited and by mid-next year all war collaborators and ex-detainess will be ready to be considered for compensation but urged them to remain patient.
He said Welfare Services for War Veterans, War Collaborators, Political Detainees and Restrictees Minister Cde Christopher Mutsvangwa was in China where he has sourced buses for war collaborators which will be distributed to all ten provinces with each region getting a bus.
He said despite lack of money, his ministry was compiling a register and every war collaborator shall have a uniform and medals used for identification purposes during national commemorations or funerals. He said a policy has been crafted and signed by President Mugabe to protect and respect the interest of war collaborators the same way war veterans are treated by Government.
