Chamisa kicks off campaign

Citizens Coalition for Change (CCC) leader Nelson Chamisa yesterday kicked off his campaign ahead of the August 23 elections by addressing Zimbabweans in neighbouring South Africa whom he asked to return home to vote.

Addressing a campaign rally in Johannesburg, Chamisa said the CCC plan was to win big to make election rigging difficult.

"This is the year, the time is now," Chamisa said.

 "On August 23 our goal is to win big because a small margin is going to be a problem.

"We are dealing with guys who like playing with figures."

He also pleaded with Zimbabweans in that country to support the CCC.

"Lets us go back and mobilise, we count on you," Chamisa said.

"We want you to help with resources, one rand or US$1 can make a huge difference.

"Zambians did it, Malawians also did it, Kenyans also did it, they did it in DRC...if they are doing it, why can't we also do it?."

Meanwhile, South Africa's ruling ANC party secretary general Fikile Mbalula yesterday said western countries were not happy with Mnangagwa's leadership.

Mbalula told the ANC's 9th Western Cape provincial conference that the West preferred Chamisa.

 "Mnangagwa brought some reforms in Zimbabwe but they did not want those reforms because they want a man called Chamisa,"  he said.

"They want him there to be the leader, the new leader of Zimbabwe, of a new Zimbabwe."

Chamisa lost to Mnangagwa with a narrow margin in the disputed 2018 elections.

Mnangagwa's victory was upheld by the Constitutional Court after Chamisa filed a challenge citing alleged rigging.

Mbalula also complained about how the country's never ending socio-economic crisis  was pushing Zimbabweans into South Africa as economic refugees.

"In the meantime, Zimbabwe as a country has moved to South Africa from Gugulethu to Khayelitsha, there is Zimbabwe there," Mbalula said.

There are no official statistics of documented and undocumented Zimbabweans in the neighbouring country, but estimates put the figure at around  three million.

There are also at least 180 000 Zimbabwean immigrants with Zimbabwe Exemption Permits (ZEP) that allow them to stay in that country legally.

The permit holders have been given a further six months to regularise them to face deportation.

"The whole country Zimbabwe has moved to South Africa," Mbalula said.

"And then we say to the Americans, we say to the British, give the Zimbabweans what they deserve because you agreed in Lancaster that you will give them 40 billion pounds for land reform and redistribution programme."

Zanu-PF says the British reneged on the Lancaster House agreement on the compensation of white farmers, which pushed Robert Mugabe's government to seize commercial farms at the turn of the millennium.