‘Mugabe will go the Pasuwa way’

Source: ‘Mugabe will go the Pasuwa way’ – DailyNews Live

Mugove Tafirenyika      24 March 2017

HARARE – Angry war veterans vowed yesterday to engineer President Robert
Mugabe’s ouster from power “the Kalisto Pasuwa way” in next year’s
eagerly-anticipated elections if the nonagenarian does not pass the
leadership baton to Vice President Emmerson Mnangagwa.

Addressing hundreds of former freedom fighters who had gathered in Harare,
the secretary-general of the Zimbabwe National Liberation War Veterans
Association (ZNLWVA), Victor Matemadanda, said they had identified “a
crisis of leadership” in the country as the biggest impediment to
Zimbabwe’s political and economic development.

He also called on war veterans to start mobilising people in rural areas
to vote against Zanu PF and Mugabe’s “failed leadership”, saying it would
be selfish for them to spend time discussing their welfare when
Zimbabweans in general were suffering terribly.

“The people we gave the power to rule over us, after we delivered the
country’s independence in 1980, have failed in that mandate and when a
team does not win, it is the coach who is fired and that is why Pasuwa was
sacked.

“It is the same reason why they (current leaders) should also go through
our vote in 2018,” Matemadanda said.

“We have now identified who the problem is and we should go out there in
the villages, in the districts and constituencies and tell the people who
that problem is.

“When a candidate is popular with the people, we must not ask which party
he is coming from because the biggest political party are the people. So,
we will back that one from councillors, MPs and the president. Talk to the
people, galvanise the masses,” he added.

Weighing in, ZNLWVA chairperson Christopher Mutsvangwa also warned Mugabe
that “things will never be the same again now that we are back united”,
noting the presence of former Zipra intelligence supremo Dumiso Dabengwa
and Agrippa Mutambara who were in attendance.

“We are a little more than 18 months away from the national vote next year
and I want to tell you that there is no weapon stronger than your vote.

“So, you must now go to the rural areas and teach the masses that another
Norton can be delivered again on a national scale,” Mutsvangwa thundered.

This comes after war veterans, along with opposition leader Morgan
Tsvangirai, backed independent candidate Temba Mliswa in last year’s
Norton by-election, culminating in the embarrassing defeat of Zanu PF
candidate Ronald Chindedza.

“It is us war veterans who know how to sell people to become electoral
winners and you will recall that Mugabe didn’t campaign for the 1980 vote
because we were on the ground selling his name,” Mutsvangwa added.

He said Mugabe could not continue to blame Western sanctions for his
government’s failures, adding that there were other people capable of
taking the country forward even in the face of the targeted restrictions.

“If you cannot bust sanctions then give up leadership and you will be
surprised that there are others who can do better to have them removed.

`We want someone who will appeal to capital by doing away with
indigenisation laws that scare away investors.

“We want to reconcile with all our people in the Diaspora, including
children of the whites who left this country because we were fighting
them. We cannot continue to create enemies because we need their skills,”
he said.

Addressing the gathering, Dabengwa pledged his support to the ZNLWVA
saying he had walked away from the ruling party after seeing “signs of
decay”.

Until their stunning fallout with Mugabe mid last year, the former freedom
fighters had for decades been a pillar of support for the 93-year-old
leader and the ruling party.

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