The Zimbabwe government plans to investigate the powerful head of the state broadcast station on allegations of homosexuality, a newspaper reported on Tuesday.
The inquiry was prompted by allegations that Alum Mpofu, chief executive of the Zimbabwe Broadcasting Corp., caused a disturbance on Thursday at a Harare nightclub after being caught "in a compromising situation" with a man, the state Herald newspaper reported on Tuesday.
Mpofu refused to comment.
President Robert Mugabe has been reviled by gay activists around the world for outlawing homosexual acts and describing same sex partners as "worse than pigs and dogs."
The accusations against Mpofu came two years after Zimbabwe's former ceremonial president, Canaan Banana, was jailed for committing homosexual acts and indecent assault on members of his presidential guard in a case that deeply embarrassed Mugabe's government.
Information Minister Jonathan Moyo said Mpofu, a ruling party loyalist appointed to lead the state broadcaster ahead of last month's presidential elections, "will be given a fair hearing and allowed time to tell his side of the story," The Herald reported.
Moyo said the broadcasters' board of directors was asked to determine the truth behind the alleged incident at a nightclub owned by a ruling party lawmaker.
Moyo recruited Mpofu, a Zimbabwean working at the South African Broadcasting Corp., last July to head changes at the ZBC that streamlined its role as a government mouthpiece. However, the government did not act like "bedroom policemen" when hiring public officials, Moyo was quoted as saying.
Mugabe, declared the winner in the disputed March 9-11 presidential poll, scoffed in his campaign at homosexuality in Britain, the former colonial power he accused to backing the opposition.
He repeatedly said British Prime Minister Tony Blair led "a government of gay gangsters and lesbians" who needed biology classes on human reproduction.
Moyo said Mpofu's alleged behaviour was "totally unacceptable" from a public official, regardless of whether a man or woman was involved.
But Moyo also condemned homosexuality.
"Sexual perverts need to be told once again that homosexuality is unnatural," he said. "The only people who accept homosexuality are liberals who think it is a way of getting votes." Sapa-AP