Garikai Fadzi
HARARE-The ruling Zanu PF party is trying to lure former party stalwarts, including Joice Mujuru and Didymus Mutasa, ousted in recent years as internal factional fights took centre stage, eventually ending former President Robert Mugabe’s 37-year rule.
Information at hand suggests the Zanu PF acknowledges Mujuru’s political prowess which, if readmitted, could be valuable for the ruling party going into the future.
Zanu PF is open to readmitting its members into the party after the crucial July 30 elections amid claims Mujuru, now People’s Rainbow Coalition leader, is among a long list of ousted Zanu PF members seeking to come back home.
Although Mujuru’s spokesperson, Gift Nyandoro, has dismissed the assertion as mischievous, a Zanu PF Politburo member says Mujuru is one of the 23 candidates vying for Zimbabwe’s top job in this year’s elections.
Mujuru was the country’s number two for ten years before her expulsion from the party and Government on treason allegations which were, however, not proved.
Zanu PF deputy secretary of youth affairs, Lewis Mathuthu, told the Business Times that many expelled members, including former secretary for administration and one of former President Robert Mugabe’s close friends, Mutasa, are trying to find their way back into Zanu PF. Mutasa has, until recently, been a critic of Mnangagwa.
“Didymus Mutasa and other people have applied for re-admission,” he said.
“The President says if those people follow proper procedures, they must be re-admitted into Zanu PF. If someone is humble and applies for re-admission, why should we stop them? Mai Mujuru is indeed a Presidential candidate, however, after elections, she will come back to her senses and re-join Zanu PF because this is where she belongs.”
The losing Zvishavane-Ngezi constituency candidate added that most people, especially Zanu PF members, are warming up to President Emmerson Mnangagwa’s message of peace and unity.
“President Mnangagwa has shifted his focus from the politics that we were used to; the politics of insulting each other, the politics of hate. Instead the President is focusing on issues to do with love and unity,” he said.
“That is dreaming and such thinking lacks substance and seriousness,” he exclaimed.
“Dr Mujuru is a political force to reckon with. ZANU PF should be prepared for the reality of a female-led government and stop purporting misplaced political hallucinations.”
On joining hands with the National Patriotic Front, believed to have the backing of former President Robert Mugabe, Nyandoro said the PRC was open to the idea.
“The People’s Rainbow Coalition is a coalition of progressive political parties and PRC’s Presidential candidate, Mujuru, is prepared to work only with genuine forces who want genuine change.”
This year’s polls are historic as a record number of 23 candidates are contesting for presidency, four of whom are women.
This is also the first election since Robert Mugabe was removed from Presidency by a military intervention in November 2017, as well as being the first election in years without Mugabe’s long-time opponent, Morgan Tsvangirai, who succumbed to cancer in February of this year.
