Zanu-PF bigwigs off to China for study tour

President Emmerson Mnangagwa's ruling Zanu-PF is sending a delegation of party bigwigs to China and the sub-region to engage sister liberation movement to compare notes as to how their parties relate to government.

This comes after Zanu-PF bigwigs who failed to make it in Cabinet were redeployed to work for the ruling party on a full-time basis.

The decision was meant to keep the party sound by ensuring that some of its cadres remain domiciled in the party while others concentrate on government business.

Senior officials such as Obert Mpofu and others who include Simon Khaya Moyo, Zanu-PF legal secretary Paul Mangwana, former Foreign Affairs minister Simbarashe Mumbengegwi, former Information minister Christopher Mushowe, Zimbabwe National Liberation War Veterans Association spokesperson Douglas Mahiya, and youth league deputy secretary Lewis Mathuthu are now working full-time at the party, joining national commissar Engelbert Rugeje with full ministerial benefits.

Khaya-Moyo said the foreign travel will provide an opportunity for the party to exchange notes with fraternal movements.

There are five liberation parties in the sub-region,  Chama Cha Mapinduzi (CCM), the People's Movement for the Liberation of Angola (MPLA), the Africa National Congress (ANC) in South Africa, Mozambique Liberation Front (Frelimo), and Swapo of Namibia, formerly known as the South West African People's Organisation.

"The secretary for external affairs, … Mumbengegwi gave an external relations report and the party's future activities in this regard. The party will be visiting a number of sister parties to compare notes as to how their parties relate to government," he said, briefing journalists after the politburo meeting on Thursday.

"There are a number of these, they include of course the ANC of South Africa, the Communist Party of China, MPLA of Angola, Frelimo of Mozambique; Swapo of Namibia; and there are a number of them across the globe who are fraternal parties, we want to learn from them as well, as to see how they are functioning."

Moyo emphasised the party's dominance over government's operations, noting that the establishment of full time Heads of Departments (HODs) at the headquarters will cement this supremacy.

"As the party reconfigures itself and moves towards exerting its supremacy over government, the president and the politburo continue to establish full time HODs at the party headquarters. The whole effort is to ensure that the party exerts itself in terms of its supremacy over government," he said.

The new departments announced last week include the department of Health; Labour and Production and the department of Industry and Economic Empowerment.

Khaya Moyo noted that efforts will be made to ensure there is harmony between the government and the party operations.

"Government is a product of the party and it must be understood at that level that policies must derive from the party and government must implement those policies, as enshrined in this case in our manifesto which made us win thunderously the 2018 harmonised elections.

So there will be a lot of work here to make sure that the party is supreme," he said.

"But we shall ensure that the two work harmoniously, that is the party and the government, so that all our policies are implemented without fear."