Zanu-PF now posing security risk to Zimbabwe

The Editor of the Zimbabwean, Wilf Mbanga, a seasoned journalist has asked in an editorial whether Grace (Mugabe) is now running government? There are also reports that the military is now on stand-by because of the instability in Zanu-PF. Could Zanu-PF be posing a security risk to Zimbabwe?

Police were informed about the planned demonstration by Itai Dzamara in African Unity Square, they quizzed him about it and he gave them all the answers they wanted, yet yesterday the police descended on him like a tonne of bricks and nearly killed him.

Meanwhile provincial chairpersons of Zanu-PF are being booted out of office by compromised elected executives, ignoring the thousands of people who elected the chairmen, no wonder some of them are refusing to vacate office, thus creating another source of tension.

According to Mbanga Grace Mugabe could be improperly interfering with, and manipulating, not just Zanu-PF business, but also government business while abusing public resources on her campaign - invoices or payments have been seen for her advertising on buses or her use of Air Force helicopters.

Her utterances as she attacked her political foes suggest that she could be getting classified government information that is normally reserved only for the Head of State, like the information that she used to lambaste Vice President Joice Mujuru.

If she was anyone else, making comments about the suitability or otherwise of a national vice-President she would have landed in the basement of Harare Central with some trainee killers practicing on her soft tissue. Ask Jestina Mukoko.

In Grace's much publicised rallies she spoke with the authority of the President, always reminding her audiences that she is the president's wife, or that she is going to tell "Baba" referring to her husband who would like to be seen as the nation's father, yet he is clearly looking out for his family at the expense of the rest.

"She sounds as though she is talking on behalf of Mugabe, and to make matters worse, he has been quiet throughout," wrote Mbanga in his editorial.

Reports that she is dictating to him who he should or should not interact with, even within the realm of government business, have not been officially denied - all factors combining to give a sense of worry that Grace could be interfering with government business, yet she has no constitutional or otherwise role in running government.

Besides the fear of someone like Grace, or another First Lady being allowed to manipulate state institutions and systems to further their own interests, there is an instability arising from the bitter factional wars by people right at the centre of government, most of them with very unsavoury backgrounds.

One Zanu-PF activist, billed as an entertainer and a businessman, Energy Mutodi publicly claimed on his Facebook Page that the under-fire Mashonaland East Provincial chairman, Ray Kaukonde is planning to murder him.
Apparently he believes that Mutodi is behind war veterans, youths and women demanding his sacking for "publicly defying the First Lady and the President, fanning factionalism and soliciting for sex from power aspiring women members of Parliament power."

Everyday seems to drag Zanu-PF deeper and deeper into an intractable crisis, with War Veterans, the traditional Zanu-PF enforcers, being pulled in different directions - either towards the aged President who wants to leave the party to his wife and who is victimising a Comrade, or to the Comrade who has the legitimacy of having seen action at the front and is already second command in the Zanu-PF hierarchy, though she was involved in high level corruption, through her husband.

Institutionalised corruption saw Police Commissioner Chihuri refuse to implement Parliamentary recommendations that spot-fines be scrapped, but now Police have been caught red-handed beating to death a Commuter driver for refusing to pay a bribe at a roadblock because his minibus was lawfully on the road.

All these issues are adding to the a bubbling anger among Zimbabweans which Zanu-PF is not addressing. Kombi drivers demonstrated about the death of Mugove, who will be buried tomorrow, but there was no apology from the Police Commissioner. It will be up to the family to seek prosecution for the police manning the roadblock.