'Lies, gossip, money destroying Zanu-PF'

LIES, gossip and money have destroyed Zanu-PF Bulawayo Province and it is time for sanity to prevail if the party is to move forward.

This was said by the party's Secretary for Administration, Obert Mpofu during an inter-district meeting at Davies Hall in the city yesterday.

"This is the issue that we are here to talk about and try to identify the challenges that are bedevilling us as a province. As you can see the lies and falsehoods started spreading before we even came to Bulawayo that we were coming to destroy structures here and start afresh, that we were going to change many things and introduce new measures which was all lies. Can people try and live by the truth as lies, gossip and money is what is killing the party," he said.

Mpofu said it was time to tell people the truth if the party is to move forward. He said when leaders do not have any people then it ceases to be a great leadership.

"This is why we sat down in Harare and said we need to look into Harare and Bulawayo provinces issues.

There is nothing that is very complex in Bulawayo but the truth of the matter is that we need to open up to each other and be leaders that speak the truth. We have to be truthful about the number of cells that we have, if they are 10, just tell us that there are 10, if you lie about this figure then you send false messages to leadership which is not correct," he said.

Mpofu said the number of people who voted the party in the province in past elections needed to be improved.

"In 2013, Zanu-PF managed to get 30 000 votes and this figure doubled in 2018 elections where we got 60 000 which is an improvement from the last election. We now want the election of 2023 to have more than 120 000 votes going to the party, in fact that must be our minimum. For the party to remain popular among the masses we need to be truthful with each other, lies do not build us. Some of you spend a lot of time gossiping about fellow comrades in the party spreading lies. We will not prosper at all as a province."

He announced that the party now had fulltime members who work for the party.

"We even have a budget now for our Central Committee members and they will be getting salaries and vehicles for their work. What is left is to give them the terms of reference and they go into the districts and branches and the province. Those vehicles are not for carrying vegetables, it must be for party business. We receive too many reports on how these resources are being misused and it is very embarrassing to say the least."

Mpofu also delved in to the issue of delays in declaring heroes status in particular for people from Bulawayo Province, saying that needed to change. But he also said the profiles and history of the cadres needs to be available when it is needed.

"I was asked by the President as to what was the challenge in Bulawayo and I told him that there are people who want to personalise the province. I was asked by one comrade why I was interfering in the issues of Bulawayo and I want to tell that comrade that I am now a part of whatever happens in the province. We want to bring sanity and not protect those people who work against the party," he said.