MDC salivates as Zanu PF implodes

via MDC salivates as Zanu PF implodes – DailyNews Live 30 December 2014 by Fungi Kwaramba

HARARE – Opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai’s MDC is salivating at the prospects of contesting dozens of by-elections across the country should the brutal infighting within President Robert Mugabe’s ruling Zanu PF party result in the booting out of up to 100 ruling party legislators from Parliament.

So bad has Zanu PF’s factional and succession wars become — which have so far claimed the political careers of dozens of its bigwigs, including former Vice President Joice Mujuru — that there are growing calls by the party’s hardliners to recall up to 100 legislators from Parliament who are perceived to be loyal to the deposed 59-year-old widow of revered liberation war hero, the late Solomon Mujuru.

And it is this “suicidal threat to liquidate all of Amai Mujuru’s allies”, as a senior Zanu PF official put it to the Daily News yesterday, that is giving — the MDC renewed hope of reversing its controversial electoral losses that it suffered last year, through by-elections.

Egged on by his quarrelsome wife Grace and erstwhile supporters of Vice President Emmerson Mnangagwa, Mugabe has already fired 16 ministers and deputies, with well-placed sources in government suggesting strongly yesterday that permanent secretaries and service chiefs linked to Mujuru were in line for “similar treatment” when the nonagenarian returns from his holiday jaunt in the Far East next month.

“It’s not just MPs who will lose their jobs soon, permanent secretaries and a good number of service chiefs will receive similar treatment, a kind of new year present, when the president returns (from his holiday),” one of the sources told the Daily News.

As a result, the MDC said yesterday that it was ready to recover lost ground from Zanu PF which was in the throes of a debilitating power struggle as its ugly factional and succession fights crystallised into a monumental bloodbath that was seeing its most popular cadres thuggishly removed from office.

Obert Gutu, MDC spokesperson, said while his party was more eager on “completely fresh polls”, it would nevertheless participate in any by-elections that may be held, provided the political playing field was levelled.

“The fact that Zanu PF is disintegrating is now beyond disputation.

Zanu PF is going to recall no less than 100 of its Members of Parliament (MPs) as the factional fighting continues unabated.

“The MDC will resoundingly win any election in Zimbabwe provided that such an election is free and fair,” Gutu said.

After being ambushed and stampeded into elections last year that were subsequently disputed, with the MDC alleging that Mugabe and Zanu PF had hired an Israeli company, Nikuv, to manipulate the process, the party is keen not to fall into the same trap.

On the other hand, however, critics of the MDC doubt that the opposition party is in a position to capitalise on Zanu PF’s internal wars to wrestle power from the ruling party if the mooted by-elections do eventually take place.

These critics point out to the fact that the MDC, which was part of the inclusive government, failed to push for critical electoral reforms when it was in government from 2009 to 2013, and thus, are now not in a position to influence things from outside. However, Gutu said “unlike Zanu PF which is structurally disintegrating, the MDC recently held a highly successful elective congress that ushered into office a new and invigorated leadership.”

He added that the newly-elected MDC leadership was “already busy” strategising and plotting the way forward.

“Zanu PF held a praise and worship ceremony that virtually created a political dinosaur in the form of Robert Mugabe. The MDC is quite capable of mobilising adequate financial and material resources to launch an effective election campaign.

“We are the real deal and the only game in town,” Gutu said.

With up to 100 Zanu PF legislators facing the boot from Parliament, many legal experts say the most ideal scenario in such an event would be for the country to hold fresh elections altogether.

Zanu PF’s Mashonaland Central province has already thrown the gauntlet in this endeavour — with new provincial chairperson Dickson Mafios saying nine legislators from the province should be recalled as they are allegedly supporters of Mujuru.

Other provincial chairpersons, who like Mafios assumed their positions in controversial fashion, have also been quoted in lapdog State media calling for the ejection of all Mujuru-linked legislators across the country.

“Right now we don’t know what they (MPs) are planning as they were loyal to Cde Mujuru,” Mafios recently told regional party structures.

“There are also rumours that they want to impeach President Mugabe if they unite with the MDC-T. So, right now we are not sure if their allegiance is towards the President and how loyal they are to Government,” he added. Meanwhile, some analysts also say it will bode well for any elections in future the fact that a mere three weeks into his tenure as Mugabe’s senior lieutenant, the knives are being sharpened against Mnangagwa as the Zanu PF faction that worked together to decimate Mujuru falls apart.

The Daily News learnt at the weekend that among Mnangagwa’s new rabid critics were erstwhile colleagues who played a critical role in annihilating Mujuru and her perceived sympathisers, a development that paved the way for his Phoenix-like rise from the political ashes to the presidium.

The sources said Mnangagwa’s former supporters were not just “peeved by his meteoric rise to the VP position” while they had to “make-do with scraps”, they were also upset that he had seemingly forgotten them and was allegedly acting as if he was now “the substantive head of State” while Mugabe was on holiday. As a result, some within the former anti-Mujuru grouping — particularly the so-called “Gang of Four” — now expeditiously wanted the tail of the party strongman cut.

The sources also claimed that it had not helped that the much-feared vice president had recently hosted parties and business persons in his home province, the Midlands, where some of the disaffected hardliners had not been invited to.

Worse still, some of Mnangagwa’s most fervent followers, such as Psychomotor minister Josiah Hungwe, had made the fatal mistake of praising him overzealously at these gatherings — at worst a silly faux  pas that the hardliners had expediently latched on to, in their quest to cut the Vice President down to size.

“There are some within the victorious camp who feel that Mnangagwa in the first place did not deserve to be vice president after doing virtually nothing during the Mujuru demolition job where First Lady Grace Mugabe was used to turn President Mugabe against Amai Mujuru,” a well-placed source told the Daily News.

He said in particular the so-called “Gang of Four”— comprising senior party bigwigs Oppah Muchinguri, Jonathan Moyo, Patrick Zhuwao and Savior Kasukuwere — was allegedly working to undermine the VP and to “expose him as a power-hungry individual who is not fit to take over from Mugabe”. This, the source added, supposedly explained why Mnangagwa, just like what had happened to Mujuru, was coming under vicious attack in the lickspittle State media — “to discredit him as much as possible”.

Respected political commentator and University of Zimbabwe lecturer Eldred Masunungure recently told the Daily News that Mujuru’s ouster would not translate into Mnangagwa’s automatic ascendency to the highest seat in government.

He said there were now two main factions in Zanu PF — namely the Gushungo (Mugabe’s totem) and Mnangagwa factions.

“The other two factions coalesced against Mujuru and now that they have decimated that faction, the question is which one remains the most dominant?

“To me the Gushungo faction is now in control of the party because Mugabe knows that real power lies in the party, not in the government, so Mnangagwa may not be the winner after all,” Masunungure said.