Mujuru, war vetsinvade Masvingo

Source: Mujuru, war vetsinvade Masvingo – DailyNews Live January 11, 2017

Mugove Tafirenyika

HARARE – Former vice president and now leader of the Zimbabwe People First
(ZPF) party Joice Mujuru will hold a crucial rally with war veterans at
Masvingo’s Mucheke Stadium next week, ahead of the crunch Bikita West
by-election in the province.

ZPF insiders, who spoke to the Daily News yesterday, said Mujuru was also
trying to enlist the participation of opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai
in the rally, as her party bids to wrest control of the Bikita
parliamentary seat which fell vacant after Munyaradzi Kereke was
incarcerated for 14 years for the rape of a minor last year.

ZPF elder Rugare Gumbo, a war veteran and the only surviving member of the
famous Dare ReChimurenga (liberation war council) also confirmed that the
rally would definitely go ahead.

The ZPF insiders who spoke to the Daily News said they were “pulling out
all the stops” to make the rally a success and to ensure that “all
right-thinking” Zimbabweans worked to win Bikita West for the opposition.

“After a rally with the war veterans, the president (Mujuru) will continue
with her tour of provinces to meet with local traditional leaders, as she
continues with the programme she started late last year,” one of the
well-placed sources said.

Some of the war veterans expected to attend the Mucheke rally include
ambassadors John Mvundura, retired army general Agrippa Mutambara, as well
as former senior military officials such as Bastian Beta, Parker Chipoyera
and Claudius Makova.

Analysts have said the widow of the late liberation icon and Zimbabwe’s
first black military commander, Solomon Mujuru, will use the Bikita West
by-election as a dry-run for the watershed 2018 national polls.

The ZPF will be represented in the by-election by Kudakwashe Gopo.

Mujuru, who was ruthlessly purged from the warring Zanu PF in late 2014,
together with her close allies who included liberation stalwarts such as
Gumbo and Didymus Mutasa – on untested claims of plotting to oust and
assassinate President Robert Mugabe – is working with Tsvangirai and other
smaller parties on a grand coalition which they say will be in place
before the end of the year.

Analysts have consistently said that a united opposition, fighting with
one purpose, would bring to an end Mugabe’s long rule – especially at this
time when the country’s economy is dying and the increasingly frail
nonagenarian is battling to keep his warring Zanu PF united.