A HEAVY exchange of gunfire erupted in the usually serene Mt Pleasant suburb in Harare Sunday as soldiers at the home of retired Lieutenant-General Engelbert Rugeje, engaged in a fierce two-hour gun battle with unknown assailants at the luxurious property.
One person was killed while five others were critically injured in the shootout. The former army chief was reportedly not at home when the incident happened.
The shootout, which played out in the early hours, comes at a time political temperatures are rising in the ruling party as heavyweights line up for positions in the impending internal elections.
Jostling for leadership positions, which observers said was taking factional lines, has intensified in recent weeks as the party prepares for district co-ordinating committee (DCC) elections.
Two distinct factions, one led by President Emmerson Mnangagwa and another by his ambitious deputy Constantino Chiwenga, have emerged since the former’s rise to power in the November 2017 military coup.
Zimbabwe Republic Police spokesperson Assistant Commissioner Paul Nyathi confirmed the shooting yesterday, but ascribed the incident to crime.
“We will advise as new information on the criminals is available,” he said.
But Rugeje’s family members told NewsDay in off-the-record briefings yesterday that they were certain that the shooting was orchestrated by his political rivals.
“One of the soldiers manning the premises discovered that there was an intruder and opened fire. The suspect was shot in the leg and stomach and was pronounced dead upon arrival at hospital. This can only be an attempt on his (Rugeje’s) life by his political enemies,” a family source said.
The suspect, sources said, managed to crawl from Rugeje’s house, but died in a neighbour’s swimming pool.
Witnesses further said what made the situation more suspicious was the fact that at the height of the gunfire, a black Range Rover vehicle with heavily tinted windows pulled up and some of the injured assailants were quickly bundled into the car, which then drove off at high speed.
Rugeje, considered a Chiwenga ally and top loyalist, was appointed national political commissar at an extraordinary Zanu PF congress in December 2017 after which Mnangagwa retired him from the army.
He was roundly criticised for pursuing a pro-Chiwenga factional agenda in the party’s chaotic primary elections to select legislative and municipal representatives ahead of the July 30, 2018 general elections.
He was, however, unceremoniously booted out by Mnangagwa soon after the elections and replaced by Gokwe Central MP Victor Matemadanda.
Mnangagwa has, since the 2018 election, been purging army generals believed to be aligned to Chiwenga.
— NewsDay
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