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.