Mugabe to meet Zanu-PF youths

ZANU-PF First Secretary and party leader President Mugabe is set to visit provinces next month to have an appreciation of the challenges facing youths, as he seeks to interface with young people across the country.

The first meeting has been earmarked for Mashonaland East province.

The engagements are expected to run until October this year as the revolutionary party's youth wing heightens preparations for the 2018 general elections.

Zanu-PF Youth League Secretary and Politburo member Kudzanayi Chipanga confirmed the meetings, saying preparations were at an advanced stage.

"The objective of the meetings is in line with our party's constitution where we have a responsibility to mobilise youths to participate in the political, social and economic activities of the country," said Chipanga.

He said socially, the Youth League would be promoting young artists, while economically, they were advocating for young people to have access to land, access to agricultural inputs and participate in mining activities.

"Politically, that is where this programme falls, where we are saying one cannot talk of politics without the President and Zanu-PF," said Chipanga.

"Zanu-PF is the game in town. We want our youths to interface with the President, the only centre of power as in line with the 2014 party congress resolution.

"He is our candidate for 2018 general elections and as the Youth League, we have been clear and consistent that we want him to be Life President."

Chipanga said the meetings came after a realisation that most youths failed to meet with President Mugabe during the One Million Men March organised by the Youth League owing to the long distance as the event was held in the capital.

"So, we are creating a political platform where our youths are able to meet with their icon," said Chipanga.

As a forerunner to the meetings by the President, said Chipanga, the Youth League's national political commissar, Innocent Hamandishe, had been visiting provinces to inform their structures of the pending visit.

"He has visited several provinces and he is left with a few," said Chipanga. "After that I will be going around as well, starting with Mashonaland East where we will have inter-district meetings and I will be announcing the dates on which the President would be visiting the province."