Msika's fury at sleeping pills revelation

Msika's fury at sleeping pills revelation

JOSEPH MSIKA: Furious

• Msika won't give in to 'immoral little boys'

• Msika warns Chiyangwa

• Zanu PF bids to oust Msika

By Staff Reporter

VICE President Joseph Msika last night cancelled an interview with Zimbabwe's internet radio station Afro Sounds FM following last week's security etiquette clanger by a bodyguard who -- unaware he was live on air -- said Msika had taken sleeping pills and could not talk.

The station rang Msika on Thursday last week and agreed to do an interview for the Zimbabwe Today programme hosted by Ezra Sibanda.

However, when Sibanda rang Msika's house, a bodyguard said the 80-year-old Vice President was unable to come to the phone "because he has taken some sleeping pills".

The stunning disclosure by the body guard was heard live by the station's world-wide audience.

Sibanda did not give up and rang the VP last night.

"The Vice President has refused to talk to us because he says we put out a message that he was on sleeping pills," Sibanda told Afro Sounds FM listeners in a caustic tone last night.

"It's not us who said he was on sleeping pills but his bodyguard."

Meanwhile, Zimbabwe's Corruption Minister Didymus Mutasa also discovered how foreign-based independent radio stations can be a pain in the backside when he terminated an interview with SW Radio Africa.

Mutasa could not withstand Violet Gonda's examination as he was asked to back his comments that American Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice was a fascist. He was also pressed on human rights violations in Zimbabwe.

An angry Mutasa stormed: "Young lady I don't think you are worth talking to. I am cutting my phone now."

And the interview ended.
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