Mugabe orders end to party insults

President Mugabe has ordered Zanu-PF members making allegations against other party cadres to present their claims in a dignified manner and through proper channels. Bemoaning increased indiscipline being exhibited by some Zanu-PF members, President Mugabe told Central Committee members last Friday that public insults and unnecessary altercations being witnessed were alien to the revolutionary party.

He said while any wrongdoings had to be exposed and discussed, they had to be done at appropriate platforms using apt channels. "Let's be serious all the time," President Mugabe, who is the Zanu-PF First Secretary, said. "Let's avoid unnecessary altercations, insulting each other. This is not to say we cannot make allegations that are justified but let them be properly made, in dignity and not in insulting ways."

He added: "The truth should be said nonetheless but it should be said on platforms like these (Central Committee). Whatever we regard as wrong-doing or things that have gone wrong we say them here. We will never keep quiet and there is nothing which can stop us from saying out those things but we do not insult each other when doing that. No! No! No. Tinetenge tichidyidzana asi tichiti aah, urikungangisa apa, tichimwidzana zvedu kana iri Coca Cola kwete Chibuku newhisky."

On unity, President Mugabe said: "We should be united, when we are united here then our membership outside there will be united at the grassroots and the country, to tell you the truth, will be united. Zimbabweans must always be united."

President Mugabe urged party cadres to take the Central Committee seriously as it was the highest decision making body in between congresses.

"What we discuss here is a matter that is being discussed by an organ of the party whose standing is only second to that of congress," he said.

"The Central Committee, in the absence of congress is the appropriate body. In other words, this is the body which takes ultimate decisions in absence of congress. Mareports anozonoiswa zvawo kucongress. Whatever is done nePolitburo, whatever we discuss along the way kumaPeople's Conferences at the end of the year, mareports edu ose taenda kucongress. We look back because then the Central Committee will be accountable to congress for all the decisions which will have been taken. But in the meantime, kuno ndiko kunokwanisa kuchinjwa zvinhu, kunokwanisa kudzingwa vanhu, kuadmitwa vanhu, asi zvichizivikanwa kuti tasvika kucongress tichazoreva kuti ndozvatakaita izvi."

The President said Zimbabweans should never relent on claiming things that they fought for such as land and natural resources despite threats by Western countries to impose more sanctions on the country.

"As you are all aware, our principled stance over our land and its resources has earned us the wrath of our erstwhile colonisers, who have responded by imposing illegal sanctions against us," President Mugabe said.

"The illegal sanctions have derailed our progressive policies of socio-economic empowerment. They have instead brought about untold economic hardships among our people. But we should never be seen to relent on what is rightly ours."