By Reason Wafawarova

Constitutional Amendment No. 3 is now gazetted. Twenty-one alterations to the Constitution of Zimbabwe. Twenty-one.

All in pursuit of retaining power beyond a constitutionally defined mandate.

We are told this is about continuity. Stability. Preserving “extraordinary work.” Protecting gains. Safeguarding economic progress.

Very well.

If continuity is the argument, then performance is the standard. And if performance is the standard, then the public record matters.

At the centre of that record stands Paul Tungwarara — a man who should never have been anywhere near the Presidency.

And through him, we must interrogate the deeper question: what exactly are we being asked to extend?

The Brand Called “Presidential”:

Over the past few years, Zimbabweans have been introduced to a parade of initiatives carrying one powerful prefix:

Presidential Borehole Scheme.
Presidential Solar Scheme.
Presidential Constituency Empowerment Fund.
Presidential Housing.
Zim Cyber City.

Each promise came wrapped in authority. Each was marketed as proof of a new economic order.

Each carried the visible endorsement of the Head of State, Emmerson Mnangagwa.

The messaging was clear: these were not ordinary projects. They were direct expressions of presidential will.

But what happens when a brand is overused — and underdelivered?

Take the borehole scheme. The promise ran into the tens of thousands of solar-powered installations across rural Zimbabwe. Villages would get water. Nutrition gardens would thrive. Livelihoods would stabilise.

Parliamentary scrutiny later painted a far less flattering picture. In several districts, drilled sites were non-functional. Village Business Units idle. Equipment incomplete. Allegations surfaced of boreholes priced far above prevailing market rates.

Is this the economic stability we are being asked to perpetuate?

Consider the Zim Cyber City at Mount Hampden — unveiled with ceremony in 2022 as a half-billion-dollar smart metropolis. Luxury villas. AI integration. Blockchain-enabled commercial zones. The groundbreaking was officiated at the highest level.

Years later, the skyline remains stubbornly unchanged.

Continuity of what, exactly?

Add to that construction contracts reportedly queried for inflated invoices. Summit villas missing deadlines. Solar housing pilots stalling midstream.

At some point, “implementation challenges” stop sounding like misfortune and start looking like pattern.

When the failure rate approaches totality, it ceases to be coincidence. It becomes systemic.

The Adviser:

The connective tissue through many of these initiatives was Paul Tungwarara — styled publicly as “Dr.”

Yet no verifiable academic record has been publicly established. No clear university. No thesis. No institutional trail. What appears in circulation is reference to an honorary doctorate from an unaccredited American entity — the sort of credential that confers ceremony, not scholarly authority.

That detail might be cosmetic — were it not attached to public office.

Because this was not merely a businessman exaggerating a résumé. This was a Special Presidential Investment Adviser, interfacing with foreign capital, negotiating projects in the President’s name, stamping “Presidential” on programmes that later faltered.

How does such an appointment occur without rigorous vetting?

In functioning democracies, proximity to power demands heightened scrutiny. Here, proximity appears to have functioned as insulation.

The Story Behind the Analysis:

Let us move from abstraction to incident.

An Indian investor — widely reported as Razaa Jishan — entered Zimbabwe with capital and confidence. He encountered the President’s investment adviser. He was sold a property in Highlands for over a million dollars. Payments were made in instalments.

It later emerged that the property allegedly belonged to another entity.

Further payments were reportedly solicited for office construction, infrastructure, permits — some of which allegedly never materialised. The cumulative figure reported in the public domain exceeded US$2 million.

Police reports were said to have been filed.

Separately, a Zimbabwean businessman reportedly loaned hundreds of thousands of dollars for construction-related tenders. Partial repayment followed. Then silence. A fraud docket was reportedly opened. Then it allegedly disappeared from the system.

These are not barroom rumours. Elements of these claims have been carried by publications. Names, figures, case references.

And through it all, one theme recurs: the invocation of presidential proximity.

When investors believe they are dealing not merely with a businessman, but with someone carrying the authority of the Presidency, due diligence relaxes. Trust expands. Risk is discounted.

If that trust is abused, the damage does not remain personal. It becomes national.

The Business Empire That Wasn’t:

Prevail International Group — headquartered, on paper, in Dubai. Linked entities registered in the United Kingdom years after flagship announcements had already been made. Domestic addresses tied to residential properties.

A website which is inactive.

Subsidiaries with grand mandates: construction, fintech, retail, ride-hailing.

One social media-fintech platform boasted tens of thousands of downloads — later revealed, through public app-store data, to consist largely of bot activity. Its successor struggled to breach triple digits in downloads.

A borehole subsidiary that Parliament lambasted for gross underperformance.

A construction arm whose corporate file was reportedly difficult to locate at the Registrar during media inquiry.

These details matter not because of their sensational value, but because they expose a deeper vulnerability: the blurring of state authority with private enterprise.

When a private entity trades on the Presidency’s name, and projects collapse, the reputational damage accrues upward.

The Numbers That Refuse to Disappear:

Let us return to the boreholes.

The target: tens of thousands.
The operational count in some reports: single digits in certain districts.

The alleged cost per unit: roughly double prevailing market rates, according to sources cited in public debate.

If even a fraction of those discrepancies hold, the gap between allocation and delivery runs into millions.

The Zim Cyber City — a US$500 million vision. Investors reportedly paid fees. Progress remains disputed. Accusations and denials have traded in the open.

Summit villas. Solar housing. River rehabilitation rights later cancelled.

Across these initiatives, one uncomfortable metric surfaces: materialisation rate.

What percentage of what was promised exists in physical, measurable, usable form?

That is not a rhetorical question. It is an accounting one.

Reputational Contagion:

When a borehole branded “Presidential” produces no water, villagers do not blame a Dubai-registered holding company. They blame the President.

When a smart city remains a field, citizens do not distinguish between adviser and appointing authority. They blame the President.

When investors allege they were misled by someone trading on presidential access, international confidence does not erode around the adviser’s surname. It erodes around the Republic.

This is reputational contagion.

And it is in this context that we are told Zimbabwe requires constitutional alteration to preserve stability.

The Manicaland Episode:

In late 2025, a vacancy opened in the Central Committee of the ruling party. Party rules reportedly required that the replacement originate from a specific district.

Tungwarara did not.

Yet what followed — widely reported — was an aggressive mobilisation of financial incentives across constituencies in Manicaland. Figures cited ran into hundreds of thousands of dollars: cash allocations, vehicle pledges, revolving funds.

The co-option was secured. Then nullified by national leadership on procedural grounds. Then reasserted at provincial level.

Senior party officials publicly warned against vote buying.

The episode revealed something deeper than factional intrigue. It demonstrated how money, proximity, and branding could distort internal democratic processes.

And it tied explicitly to a political condition: support for extending Mnangagwa’s presidency beyond 2030.

Here, the Tungwarara story collides directly with Amendment No. 3.

The Tagwirei Flip:

In early 2026, Tungwarara publicly attacked businessman Kudakwashe Tagwirei — accusing him of undue influence and leadership unfitness. Rallies followed. Statements escalated.

Within weeks, after apparent presidential intervention, the tone reversed. Tagwirei became mentor. Conflict became misunderstanding.

The episode was not merely theatrical. It exposed a man whose positions shifted with the wind of political pressure.

Principle gave way to survival.

When such volatility sits adjacent to state authority, instability follows.

The Constitutional Question:

The 2013 Constitution enshrines presidential term limits. Not as decoration. As guardrail.

Amendment No. 3 proposes twenty-one alterations.

Why so many? Why now?

If the work has been extraordinary — if delivery has been transformative — why not allow constitutional succession to cement that legacy?

Term limits are not insults. They are institutional discipline.

To alter them in the shadow of unresolved governance controversies risks sending a troubling signal: that preservation of office outweighs preservation of credibility.

Stability or Accountability?

We are told investors crave predictability.

They do.

But they also crave enforceable contracts. Transparent procurement. Independent courts. Leadership transitions that honour constitutional timelines.

Which unsettles markets more: a lawful transition at the end of a mandate, or persistent headlines about stalled mega-projects and advisers entangled in allegations?

Economic stability is not a personality trait. It is an institutional outcome.

Institutions mature when leadership changes peacefully within defined limits.

The Moral Hazard:

Perhaps the gravest danger in the Tungwarara saga is not any single allegation. It is the perception that proximity to the First Family creates a protective halo.

When complainants fear pursuing cases because of who stands behind the accused, the rule of law erodes invisibly.

When dockets reportedly disappear, trust decays.

That corrosion cannot be cured by constitutional amendment.

It can only be cured by visible, impartial accountability.

Continuity Versus Legitimacy:

Continuity without legitimacy is brittle.

If Amendment No. 3 is perceived as a vehicle to retain power for a President who has reached the end of his constitutional mandate, polarisation will deepen.

Zimbabweans are not clamouring for perpetual incumbency. They are asking for functional infrastructure, reliable power, clean water, transparent governance.

They are asking that when a project is launched in their name, it materialises.

They are asking that when allegations surface, investigations follow.

They are asking that constitutional rules apply equally to all — friend and foe alike.

The Juxtaposition:

On one side: claims of extraordinary work demanding continuity beyond constitutional limits.

On the other: stalled projects, parliamentary rebukes, unresolved fraud allegations, inflated invoices, internal party vote-buying controversies, and the reputational shadow of a controversial adviser.

This is the juxtaposition.

If this is stability, it is a curious version of it.

If this is continuity, it requires justification far more robust than slogans.

The Democratic Test:

A confident administration does not fear succession. It embraces it as proof of institutional strength.

A durable legacy does not require constitutional surgery. It rests on measurable outcomes.

If the work has been transformative, history will record it. If it has not, no amendment can manufacture that verdict.

The Constitution is not an inconvenience to be edited around personalities. It is the social contract.

And before we alter it — twenty-one times over — in pursuit of extending one man’s tenure, we must be brutally honest about the record we seek to preserve.

Because continuity is only virtuous when what continues deserves to.