Zimbabwe on the edge

Source: Zimbabwe on the edge – DailyNews Live

Fungi Kwaramba      15 November 2017

HARARE – Amid the country’s deepening political crisis, owing to worsening
infighting within Zanu PF, analysts said yesterday that Monday’s
unprecedented move by the military to warn President Robert Mugabe and his
warring ruling party – that they would step in to stop its mindless
bloodletting – showed that the country could be reaching “a point of no
return”.

The fear of a looming, full-bloodied political crisis came as tension
filled the streets of many urban areas yesterday, with an unusually heavy
presence of security forces being spotted on major roads leading into
Harare.

This follows Monday’s ominous warning by angry military commanders – led
by their boss Constantino Chiwenga – that they were no longer prepared to
allow any more anarchy within the brawling ruling Zanu PF.

At the same time, the Zanu PF youth league appeared to pour petrol into
the raging fire yesterday when it attacked Chiwenga as a general who had
gone rogue.

“Therefore, we will not sit idly and fold our hands whilst cheap pot-shots
and threats are made against the legitimate and popularly elected leader
of the revolutionary party … and Zimbabwe,” youth leader Kudzanai
Chipanga said at a press conference in Harare.

Speaking to the Daily News yesterday, respected University of Zimbabwe
political science lecturer Eldred Masunungure said Monday’s unexpected
move by the military was “very significant” and possibly a sign that the
country had now crossed the “red line”.

“This is a historical development and we have to go back to the days of
the liberation struggle for parallels. This is more so because the special
relationship between the ruling party on one hand and the army and
civilians on the other, that started during the liberation struggle has
obtained until now.

“We are now seeing a contestation between the two … and this redefines
the once harmonious relationship between them. These are indeed
extraordinary times and the political red line has been crossed. There is
a redefinition of relations and they (military commanders) are stating
that they have a stake in the ruling party.

“That statement also suggests that the military is prepared for the worst
and thus it now also depends on which path Mugabe will take going
forward,” Masunungure said.

Political analyst and former civic leader McDonald Lewanika also said
Chiwenga’s statement was “significant and has the potential to cause chaos
in the country”.

“The path that Zimbabwe is now set on is treacherous and a lot will depend
on the extent to which the CDF (Commander of the Defence Forces, Chiwenga)
follows through on his warnings should his demands not be met.

“I think that the intervention by the CDF, while regrettable, is a
game-changer and a lot will depend on the extent to which his threats are
taken seriously.

“Already, the Zanu PF youth league has rubbished the statement, but the
reality is that given the military’s role in Zanu PF, the CDF’s actions
call for a pause and possible alterations to plans that had gotten into
full swing to turn the December congress into an inauguration of Mugabe’s
preferred successor,” Lewanika said.

Speaking in his unprecedented public reprimand of Mugabe and Zanu PF on
Monday, Chiwenga warned the former liberation movement against firing
struggle stalwarts from within its ranks.

“The current purging of which is clearly targeting members of the party
with a liberation background must stop forthwith,” the visibly angry
general thundered at a media conference in the capital.

His open and scathing criticism of the ruling party’s leadership came
after former vice president Emmerson Mnangagwa was fired from both the
government and the party last week, for allegedly showing “traits of
disloyalty”.

“It is pertinent to restate that the Zimbabwe Defence Forces remain the
major stockholder in respect to the gains of the liberation struggle and
when these are threatened we are obliged to take corrective measures,”
Chiwenga said whilst flanked by the commander of the Zimbabwe National
Army, General Phillip Valerio Sibanda, the acting commander of the Air
Force of Zimbabwe, as well as several major generals and brigadier
generals.

Piers Pigou, a senior consultant with the International Crisis Group, told
the Daily News that the statement by the military was “the strongest sign
yet” that Zimbabwe had entered “unchartered waters”.

“Chiwenga’s statement ups the ante and is a direct challenge to Mugabe …
In other words, consciously or unconsciously, Chiwenga appears to be
accusing Mugabe of promoting, or at least protecting counter-revolutionary
elements. This is a significant escalation of rhetoric that now goes
beyond simple posturing,” he said.

“Whilst there is every reason to be concerned about the security sector
acting outside constitutional parameters … Zanu PF’s penchant for
selective engagement with the rule book may well have come back to bite
them,” he added.

On his part, professor of World Politics at the School of Oriental &
African Studies at the University of London in the United Kingdom, Stephen
Chan, said the stage was delicately set for “a showdown” between Mugabe
and the military – and the next few days could “reconfigure the country’s
political outlook forever”.

“It sets the stage for a showdown. Mugabe may have to contemplate two
options: inviting Mnangagwa back into the government, or facing down the
generals,” Chan said.

Zanu PF has for the past five years been devouring itself through its
internecine infighting, which first led to the expulsion of former vice
president Joice Mujuru in the run-up to the party’s hotly-disputed
congress in 2014.

Mujuru – together with party stalwarts who included Cabinet ministers
Didymus Mutasa and Rugare Gumbo –  were hounded out of the former
liberation movement on untested allegations of plotting to topple Mugabe
from power.

At the beginning of 2015, the infighting escalated further, as a faction
of young Turks going by the moniker Generation 40 (G40) launched a vicious
and ultimately successful assault on Mnangagwa, as it went full steam to
derail his ambitions to succeed Mugabe.

Mnangagwa, until his surprise sacking last week, had been Mugabe’s aide
for more than five decades and many people were for long seeing him as a
shoo-in to succeed the Zanu PF leader.

However, and particularly since the beginning of this year, it had become
evident that the relationship between the two men had become increasingly
strained and untenable. With Zanu PF divided in the middle over the
party’s unresolved succession riddle, the tribal and factional feuds took
an ominous turn in August when Mnangagwa fell sick during an interface
rally in Gwanda – which his backers said was allegedly a poison attack by
his G40 enemies.

The Midlands godfather was later airlifted to South Africa where he
received emergency surgery.  He subsequently issued a statement denying
that his illness was caused by ice cream from the First Family’s Gushungo
Dairies, although he consistently suggested that he had indeed been
poisoned.

In the past few weeks, powerful first lady Grace cranked up the heat on
Mnangagwa, accusing him of fanning the ruling party’s rampant
factionalism, being a coward and also occupying a position that should
have been reserved for a woman.

After firing Mnangagwa, who has since gone into self-imposed exile, Zanu
PF provinces have now also since gone on to recommend the expulsion of
more than 100 senior officials said to have been backing him.