News / National
Zanu-PF manifesto expected on Friday
03 Jul 2013 at 03:08hrs | Views
ZANU-PF is set to launch its election campaign and manifesto at the historic Zimbabwe Grounds in Highfield, Harare on Friday. The date and venue were decided in the wake of recommendations to the party hierarchy by the Zanu-PF national elections directorate.
"The national elections directorate recommended that it be launched at the Zimbabwe Grounds because that is where the history of the liberation struggle peaked. That is where President Mugabe addressed people when he returned from Mozambique. We think the venue is quite historic," Zanu-PF spokesperson Rugare Gumbo said.
The Zimbabwe Grounds was the site of the first star rally addressed by President Mugabe when he and other freedom fighters returned from Mozambique on January 27 1980, five years after he crossed into Mozambique on April 4 1975 having spent 11 years in the Rhodesian regime's prisons.
Mugabe and other cadres were welcomed by a crowd estimated at 1,6 million by the Zanu-PF information and publicity department, 200 000 by the BBC, 150 000 by the Rhodesian police, and 1 million - with a safety margin of 25 percent - by people who said they arrived at the figure by enlarging aerial photographs and calculating crowd density.
Whatever the final figure, a crowd never before seen in the history of this country welcomed Mugabe at Zimbabwe Grounds.
It was by far the largest crowd to welcome any of the nationalist leaders who were to contest the general election set for March 1980.
Even Abel Muzorewa's so-called Huruyadzo rally, where people were bribed with beer and food over three days to attend, paled in comparison to the multitudes that welcomed Mugabe that day.
The launch of the election campaign and party manifesto follows the party's highly subscribed, peaceful primary elections held last month which saw a number of new cadres getting the ticket to represent the revolutionary party in harmonised elections set for July 31.
The Zanu-PF election manifesto and campaign are hinged on the theme "Indigenise, Empower, Develop and Create Employment'' that captures the party's empowerment thrust designed to move the independence from the political to the economic dimension.
Under the indigenisation and economic empowerment programme, foreign-owned firms are obliged to cede at least 51 percent shareholding to indigenous Zimbabweans.
A number of companies have since complied with the regulations, culminating in the launch of 59 community share ownership schemes and several employee share trusts countrywide that have since transformed several communities that had never benefited from the operations of multinational companies in their localities.
The empowerment programme, a consolidation of Zanu-PF's black emancipation programme, follows that highly successful land reform programme that transferred land from 6 000 white commercial farmers to over 300 000 black families whose lives have since been significantly transformed.
These pro-people policies were launched amid fierce opposition from the MDC formations that hold a brief for Western countries that convened to launch the MDC in 1999 in a bid to unseat Zanu-PF and stop the fast-track land reform programme.
"The national elections directorate recommended that it be launched at the Zimbabwe Grounds because that is where the history of the liberation struggle peaked. That is where President Mugabe addressed people when he returned from Mozambique. We think the venue is quite historic," Zanu-PF spokesperson Rugare Gumbo said.
The Zimbabwe Grounds was the site of the first star rally addressed by President Mugabe when he and other freedom fighters returned from Mozambique on January 27 1980, five years after he crossed into Mozambique on April 4 1975 having spent 11 years in the Rhodesian regime's prisons.
Mugabe and other cadres were welcomed by a crowd estimated at 1,6 million by the Zanu-PF information and publicity department, 200 000 by the BBC, 150 000 by the Rhodesian police, and 1 million - with a safety margin of 25 percent - by people who said they arrived at the figure by enlarging aerial photographs and calculating crowd density.
Whatever the final figure, a crowd never before seen in the history of this country welcomed Mugabe at Zimbabwe Grounds.
It was by far the largest crowd to welcome any of the nationalist leaders who were to contest the general election set for March 1980.
The launch of the election campaign and party manifesto follows the party's highly subscribed, peaceful primary elections held last month which saw a number of new cadres getting the ticket to represent the revolutionary party in harmonised elections set for July 31.
The Zanu-PF election manifesto and campaign are hinged on the theme "Indigenise, Empower, Develop and Create Employment'' that captures the party's empowerment thrust designed to move the independence from the political to the economic dimension.
Under the indigenisation and economic empowerment programme, foreign-owned firms are obliged to cede at least 51 percent shareholding to indigenous Zimbabweans.
A number of companies have since complied with the regulations, culminating in the launch of 59 community share ownership schemes and several employee share trusts countrywide that have since transformed several communities that had never benefited from the operations of multinational companies in their localities.
The empowerment programme, a consolidation of Zanu-PF's black emancipation programme, follows that highly successful land reform programme that transferred land from 6 000 white commercial farmers to over 300 000 black families whose lives have since been significantly transformed.
These pro-people policies were launched amid fierce opposition from the MDC formations that hold a brief for Western countries that convened to launch the MDC in 1999 in a bid to unseat Zanu-PF and stop the fast-track land reform programme.
Source - herald
