Zanu PF has started targeting Vice President Emmerson Mnangagwa’s suspected backers following accusations that he is plotting against President Robert Mugabe.
On Friday, the ruling party’s commissar Saviour Kasukuwere and secretary for administration Ignatious Chombo descended on Masvingo where they signalled that another purge was looming in Zanu PF.
Mugabe has singled out Masvingo and Midlands as sources of divisions in Zanu PF, which he said had taken a tribal dimension.
Journalists from the private media were barred from attending the Friday meeting, but sources said Chombo and Kasukuwere did not mince their words, that they would soon crack the whip on those perceived to be against Mugabe.
“The message was very clear…. Kasukuwere said he was sent by the president to discipline the province,” the source said.
Kasukuwere is using Zanu PF’s ongoing voter mobilisation exercise to rein in suspected members of Mnangagwa’s faction.
The exercise started in Harare last Thursday before moving to Masvingo the following day. Kasukuwere was in Mashonaland Central province yesterday and was accompanied by Chombo, Zanu PF spokesperson Simon Khaya-Moyo, women’s league secretary for administration Letina Undenge, Chiratidzo Mabuwa as well as war veterans linked to G40 led by George Mlala.
Today the team will be in Mashonaland West and in the Midlands as well as Matabeleland North during the week.
During the meetings, it is believed attempts would be made to build Defence minister Sydney Sekeramayi’s profile.
Sekeremayi is G40’s candidate in the race to succeed Mugabe. independent
