Mujuru boasts of Zanu-PF MPs support

Leader of the newly-formed opposition Zimbabwe People First has said she is still in contact with several top Zanu-PF officials as she seeks to booby-trap the ruling party in the keenly-awaited 2018 elections.

The former vice president told South African 24-hour TV news channel eNCA on Wednesday that many in the ruling party are afraid to speak against their disillusionment with President Robert Mugabe's continued rule. She claimed top Zanu-PF lieutenants were suffering in silence but will jump ship to her party once the time comes.

"As I am speaking today, with what is happening, there are Zanu-PF people who are actually working with us," Mujuru said.

Her startling revelations are likely to ruffle feathers in the deeply-divided Zanu-PF that is presently embroiled in mindless bloodletting factional wars, pitting the Team Lacoste faction that is linked to vice president Emmerson Mnangagwa and the G40 faction that is reportedly led by first lady Grace Mugabe.

This also comes amid fears by Mugabe's inner circle that there are scores of MPs in the ruling party who are likely to jump ship in 2018 after completing their parliamentary terms. If they jump ship now, they fear losing their legislative benefits.

Analysts have noted that while Zanu-PF continues on its self-inflicted path of destruction — with even Mugabe concerned that his ruling party could disintegrate — the political environment in the country is set for a major shake-up and possible rejuvenation.

Mujuru, who was considered a liberal, was kicked out of Zanu-PF in 2014 along with other former leading lights of the ruling party such as Rugare Gumbo, Didymus Mutasa and Dzikamai Mavhaire.

While many are still sceptical about her sincerity in opposing Zanu-PF's rule and policies and on whether she has repented, Mujuru said her past differences with Mugabe, specifically in 2008, should show the world that she was always against violence.

"The violence of 2008, that should have shown the world that I voiced against what happened and the worst of such practices happened in my province (Mashonaland Central) and I grouped people and denounced violence and my question was who gave that order to kill people in a province that Mugabe had won resoundingly, that was my question. I don't know who made the orders but I know that it was Zanu-PF killing MDC supporters," Mujuru said.

Hundreds of MDC supporters were killed in cold blood by alleged Zanu-PF supporters and functionaries in 2008 and Mujuru's statements are likely to cause panic among those who were involved at the time she was an insider, with access to top secrets.

Mujuru said while she tried to confront Mugabe on the killings, she got a hostile reaction, regarded as a rebel.

"When you ask who gave those orders and you get no answers, you are labelled a liberal and there are all sorts of allegations made, that made them think that I was not part of them," she said.

Although Mujuru was expelled from Zanu-PF two years ago on untested allegations of plotting a coup against Mugabe, factionalism is still raging on in the ruling party, with knives now out for her predecessor Mnangagwa ahead of the party's conference in Masvingo next week.

"There was a struggle within a struggle within Zanu-PF but even now you can see, after being chucked out was there peace and why is it that it is even worse? You can see I was not the problem, they were the problem, I was trying to bring peace, which they refused to accept."

Describing her stay in Zanu-PF as terrible, Mujuru said even when she confronted Mugabe, she was for the most part ignored.

Mujuru rose to be Zanu-PF vice president in 2004, clinging on the epaulettes of her late husband Solomon, who she revealed was brutally murdered by his comrades in Zanu-PF who also eventually expelled her.

NKC, a privately-owned political and economic research unit located in Western Cape, with a focus on the African continent, said Mujuru has not suddenly become a critic of Zimbabwe's economic policies, but rather has a record of dissent from within her previous office as vice president of the country.

"Secondly, there is strong evidence to suggest that when she was expelled from the party and government, she took a large slice of her support base with her and that her party provides an attractive alternative to those still within Zanu-PF who are disillusioned and resentful of the new power plays while the ailing president seems powerless to exercise his authority," NKC analyst Gary van Staden said in a recent report.

"Thirdly, her ability to attract support from the current crop of opposition parties will be important and increase the extent to which the opposition can present a united front in 2018."

He cited the growing discontent within Zanu-PF ranks over the role and influence of the unelected first lady Grace Mugabe and "her increasingly hysterical and irrational attacks on supposed successors to her husband and their various ‘plots'".

"Two ironies are also evident: that after the bitter and brutal infighting to succeed . . . Mugabe, the victor loses the office to Ms Mujuru and, second, Ms Mugabe recently acknowledged that her campaign against Ms Mujuru back in 2014 was a mistake — she may yet see just how big," Van Staden said.