The stage was set. The lights were on. Then click off.
At the grand new parliamentary chamber in Mt Hampden on October 28, President Emmerson Mnangagwa was nearly finishing his State of the Nation Address when the power gave in.
The grand hall plunged into darkness. A single torchlight glowed. The President read on. In the crowd: MPs, dignitaries, and the nation watching.
Suddenly, the Zimbabwe president holds a script lit by an aide’s flashlight. The moment: absurd.
Electric. Symbolic. The lights came back on just after he concluded. Then came the fireworks.
The managing director of Zimbabwe Electricity Transmission and Distribution Company (ZETDC), Abel Gurupira, was summarily sacked.
Was he fired due to a blackout? That’s how the story reads. Sources say the energy minister ordered his removal.
The deeper story: the outage wasn’t random. Parliament had reportedly sidestepped ZETDC entirely for the power supply that day, using a hired generator.
That generator failed. One parliamentary memo shows ZETDC was meant to be the backup.
It didn’t help that the speaker of the house, Jacob Mudenda, publicly vowed vengeance.
“The person who switched off electricity while the President was speaking will regret the day he was born,” he thundered.
The symbolic power of the scene is massive. In a country already coping with rolling blackouts, a national leader reading in the dark becomes a metaphor.
The scene is characterised by malfunctioning power lines. Failing infrastructure. A system failing to live up to its own expectations.
This wasn’t just a hiccup. It was a wake-up call.
With demand outstripping supply and generation faltering, Zimbabwe’s energy crisis is laid bare in moments like this.
READ ALSO: Day fake Mr Bean was hired to entertain Zimbabweans
The flashy parliament building and the bright speeches – they didn’t stop the lights from flicking off.
“The fast-tracked firing gives the appearance of accountability. But the real work is slower, costlier, and far less dramatic,” wrote one of the commentators.
PAY ATTENTION: Reach us at info@gotta.news.
