Zimbabweans say Ugandan judge can't preach to them about corruption

Zimbabweans have protested against their Chief Justice’s decision to invite a Ugandan judge to lecture them on how to fight corruption.

These argue that Uganda is more corrupt and not a country they should learn from.

Zimbabwe’s Chief Justice Luke Malaba invited Uganda’s head of anti-corruption court, Justice Lawrence Gidudu to train Zimbabwean judges ahead of the establishment of anti-corruption courts in Zimbabwe.

According to Zimbabwe’s state-owned newspaper, Malaba said that since Uganda had waged a war against the vice that they are trying to curb, he wanted the Ugandan judge to run a week-long training course for Zimbabwean judges, magistrates and state officials.

According to the same Herald newspaper, Zimbabwe is set to establish anti-corruption courts.

This decision was received with mixed reactions with a section of Zimbabweans saying that Uganda is also suffering with high rates of corruption and should not be benchmarked from.

The protesters want Zimbabwe to benchmark from either Rwanda or South Africa among the African countries or Singapore, Netherlands and Malaysia elsewhere.

“We cannot benchmark from these Museveni chaps. Why not Rwanda or South Africa?” one Zimbabwean asked.

President Emmerson Mnangagwa recently declared that corruption is Zimbabwe’s biggest enemy and they were making efforts to fight it to the core.

Chief Justice Malaba however insisted that Zimbabwe had a lot to learn from Uganda.

According to the recently released 2019 corruption index, Uganda was ranked 137 out of 180 countries while Zimbabwe sits in the 158 position.