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Joice Mujuru

ELSEWHERE on these pages, we publish two articles that best illustrate the futility of opposition politics in Zimbabwe. At the weekend, President Mugabe held a meeting with war collaborators, ex-detainees, ex-restrictees, widows of fallen heroes, non-combatant cadres and war victims.

During his address, the President revealed that he recently received a strange telephone call from former Zanu-PF secretary for Administration and Presidential Minister Mr Didymus Mutasa. During the call, the former Minister, now a senior member of the Zimbabwe People First party, asked about the President and the First family’s health before terminating the conversation without revealing the real reason he had called Cde Mugabe out of the blue.

There have been murmurs of discontent within the ZimPF camp with Messrs Mutasa and Rugare Gumbo among other cadres who left Zanu-PF with their leader, Dr Joice Mujuru, allegedly unhappy with her leadership style. The “elders” reportedly feel sidelined with Dr Mujuru preferring to work with young blood.

The forthcoming convention will effectively seal the fate of the likes of Mr Mutasa who probably now face an uncertain future politically. With that in mind, the unusual call to the President could have been a cry from the wilderness from a man feeling lost, dazed and isolated in the treacherous opposition trenches. With a chuckle, President Mugabe revealed how the strange conversation with Mr Mutasa went.

“I was told that Mr Mutasa had phoned, wanting to talk to me. then I picked up the phone and asked is it Mr Mutasa? And he said it’s me Cde President) ‘Ah, It’s a long time since we spoke’.

“How are you?, And I said ah, I am alright. How are you. How is ambuya and the whole family?

“And he said we are all well. Then I said what about your ambuya who I heard was not feeling well, is she alright? Then he said she is alright. Then he said that was all he wanted to know.

“Is that all he wanted to know!!?” he said amid laughter from the floor. Yesterday, Mr Mutasa tried to spin his way out of the embarrassing episode by telling a private newspaper that the phone call to the President was to request a face to face meeting to discuss electoral reforms.

Why he didn’t make the request during the call, only he can explain. But the long and short of it is that the man is clearly reaching out and would rush back to Zanu-PF in a heartbeat. His colleague in ZimPF and former war veterans leader Mr Jabulani Sibanda is not faring well in the nascent party either.

Insiders say he hasn’t attended a meeting or been part of party programmes for the past six months. Dr Mujuru, like all other opposition parties, is making Matabeleland her second home and was in Bulawayo on Sunday. JB was nowhere to be seen. For a man touted as one of the driving forces behind the party, Mr Sibanda is doing ZimPF a disservice.

Clearly there is trouble in paradise and it’s only a matter of time before he serves divorce papers on the party. As the clock times slowly towards the 2018 general elections, it is becoming quite apparent to opposition parties that they stand very little chance of upstaging Zanu-PF at the plebiscite and it is that realisation that is probably informing the likes of Messrs Mutasa and Sibanda to rethink their departure from a party that made them what they are today.

The party’s annual national people’s conference is around the corner and Zanu-PF has a history of accommodating lost souls and rehabilitating serial offenders.

Already, the party has shown remarkable pragmatism by lifting the suspensions of cadres who were disciplined for being part of a cabal led by Dr Mujuru which wanted to unconstitutionally seize power. By closing ranks at such a crucial stage, the party is obviously aware of the dangers of disunity.

The tent is big enough and all those who transgressed against the party have taken their medicine and are back. Messrs Mutasa, Sibanda and their ilk who feel they erred by ditching the revolutionary party should swallow their pride and retrace their footsteps. It’s never too late.