ZANU PF leader President Emmerson Mnangagwa is slowly
girding himself for his first election, but his opponents claim his apparent
confidence could be a sign he has something sinister up his sleeve.
Mnangagwa’s main rival and MDC Alliance presidential
candidate Nelson Chamisa has already plunged onto the campaign trail with
well-attended rallies across the country, but Zanu PF has uncharacteristically
taken an indifferent attitude to the general elections altogether, leaving
their opponents unsure of what to expect.
MDC Alliance spokesperson Welshman Ncube said Zanu PF has
been transformed into a military organisation since the army facilitated
Mnangagwa’s rise to power last November, hence, the ruling party’s indifference
to the upcoming polls.
“It is wrong to think or assume that Zanu PF has not been
campaigning. They are on the ground, but not in the traditional way we all know
political parties operating,” he said.
“Zanu PF is now a military organisation. There are no true
civilians in control of Zanu PF as we speak. You will not see the ordinary
campaign you will see from a normal political party because the military is
laying the groundwork for a final assault on the people as we head into the
election.”
The former Industry minister claimed government, in cohorts
with Zanu PF, was “a lot of military hardware in preparation for what they
think will be a confrontation.”
But Zanu PF youth league deputy secretary Lewis Matutu
challenged the opposition alliance to prove the claims of military deployment.
“Instead of throwing mud everywhere, they should prove
their claims. If this really true, we will help them fight such practices
[deployment of soldiers] because we do not agree with that as the youth
league,” Matutu said.
Former Higher Education minister Jonathan Moyo, now linked
to a new political outfit, the National Patriotic Front, claimed Mnangagwa and
his deputy, Retired General Constantino Chiwenga had a “rigging plan”.
“Why Mnangagwa and Chiwenga are not on the ground
campaigning with polls four months away: they have a rigging plan, the army
will do another coup (or) they have given up.
MID [Military Intelligence Department], CIO [Central
Intelligence Organisation] and (Retired Lieutenant General Englebert) Rugeje
(Zanu PF national commissar)’s commissariat give ED (Mnangagwa) 15% of the
presidential vote and Zanu PF junta 60 out of the 210 constituencies,” Moyo
said on his Twitter account.
Chiwenga last week urged his party supporters to ignore Moyo,
characterising the former minister as “bitter and mad”.
While government has denied claims from the opposition that
it has deployed the army in the country’s rural areas, Ncube maintained
military personnel were visiting traditional leaders at night and threatening
them with a repeat of what happened in 2008.
Following a first round loss to then MDC-T leader Morgan
Tsvangirai in the 2008 March presidential election, former President Robert
Mugabe unleashed the army on the population in what turned out to be one of the
most gruesome electoral periods this country has ever seen.
The bloodbath forced Tsvangirai to pull out of the run-off
election, triggering international condemnation and Sadc’s intervention, which
gave birth to a unity government.
Ncube added: “They have bought millions of T-shirts and
other campaign paraphernalia which our people will be forced to wear. We are,
however, aware and working to counter that.”
But Coalition of Democrats presidential candidate Elton
Mangoma said he was not worried about whatever strategy Zanu PF would employ
with the exception of violence.
“We are concerned that a few of our people have been beaten
by Zanu PF thugs in Makoni [Manicaland] and Epworth. As long as they do not
resort to violence, then we are the least worried about their tactics. We do
not care,” he said. Newsday
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