PUBLIC Service Minister Eliphas Mukonoweshuro has died.
The former university lecturer died in South Africa early Friday morning after undergoing a “minor operation”, a cabinet colleague said.
He was 58.
“We are recipients and bearers of very sad and tragic news of the passing on of one of our most intellectually-decorated and dedicated cadres in the struggle for real change in Zimbabwe,” Information Communication Technology Minister Nelson Chamisa said.
“Professor Mukonoweshuro died in the early hours of this morning in South Africa after a short illness,” added Chamisa, who was also the acting Public Service Minister in Mukonoweshuro’s absence.
Mukonoweshuro, a chain smoker, is believed to have had a lung disease. But Chamisa, who said he spoke to him several times over the last two weeks, could only confirm that the MDC-T national executive member had undergone a “minor op” at a South African clinic.
“He told me he had gone to SA for a minor op. His wife was with him.”
Mukonoweshuro, a former Dean of Social Studies at the University of Zimbabwe, was a “doyen of intellectualism”, Chamisa said.
“His intellectual firepower was second to none. One of the most beautiful flowers in the garden of the MDC has just wilted,” added Chamisa, who is also the organising secretary of the MDC-T.
Born in Gutu in 1953, Mukonoweshuro was an adviser to MDC-T leader Morgan Tsvangirai for most of the last decade. He finally entered politics after running for MP in Gutu South in March 2008.
He was appointed minister by Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai in February 2009, in a power sharing government with President Robert Mugabe's Zanu PF and a rival MDC faction led by Industry and Commerce Minister Welshman Ncube.
Mukonoweshuro stood against Tendai Biti for the post of MDC-T secretary general in April and lost.
As minister, he was credited with commissioning an audit of the bloated civil service which showed 70,000 “ghost workers” on the government pay roll.
But he also fought running battles with public sector workers’ unions over low pay for civil servants.
Officials in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs said the government would take charge of the repatriation of his body from South Africa.
He is survived by his wife and a son.
Mourners were gathering at the Mukonoweshuro family home at 11 Woodgate Road, Northwood, in Mt Pleasant.