Robert Mugabe says he earns $4,000 a month

HARARE

Zimbabwe President Robert Mugabe says he earns $4,000 (Sh344,000) a month with State media claiming that he is the lowest paid head of State in southern Africa.

The veteran ruler disclosed his salary in an interview with Ghanaian journalists Roy Agyemang for BBC documentary titled “Robert Mugabe @90.”

“I am earning $4000 just now, because of the hard times this is what we decided on, that we should recognise the hard times at the moment,” he said.

The majority of Zimbabwean workers earn less than $500 (Sh43,000) a month, which is barely enough in a dollarised economy.

However, the government recently revealed that heads of parastatals and other State linked firms were raking in huge amounts of money in allowances every month.

A chief executive in a government medical aid society was found to be earning close to $250 000 (Sh21.5 million) a month.

The government last month reduced salaries of heads of parastatals to $6000 (516,000) a month.

President Mugabe said the government was still scrutinising the salaries.

“All the parastatals now we were discussing them. One-by-one we will go through them all and see what they were paying to the management. “It’s the management that were benefiting in most of these cases,” he said.

The announcement of President Mugabe’s salary did little to excite Zimbabweans as his family is known to be very rich.

The 90-year-old leader recently gave his daughter 100 cows when she married a pilot.

He also helped finance the plush wedding that reportedly cost $5 million.

His Zanu PF party holds lavish parties to celebrate his birthday every year and allegedly spent $1 million for his 90th birthday.