Mugabe seethes with anger

The meeting, which started at around 10:00am yesterday continued into the evening and had not ended by 8:30pm.
But sources glued to the proceedings said the meeting was tense and uncharacteristically frank as politburo members took each other to task over alleged unbecoming behaviour.
The main talking point was said to be Webster Shamu, the ZANU-PF national political commissar’s report on how the party could restore sanity in District Coordinating Commi-ttees (DCCs) where attempts to rejuvenate them through elections  further divided the party. The elections were fraught with incidents relating to the imposition of candidates and vote buying.
Sources said suspensions could be imminent for those fingered to be behind the chaos which reared its ugly head in provinces such as Manicaland, Midlands, Masvingo and Matabele-land.
While it has been difficult to link the movers and shakers in ZANU-PF’s power dynamics to the events of the past two weeks or so, impeccable sources said the crisis engulfing the party has its roots in President Mugabe’s succession.
There are those in ZANU-PF who feel there is need for them to position themselves in case President Mugabe might not want to remain in office after the forthcoming elections.
This is despite the fact that the President has said he is going nowhere. He fears leaving the party at this juncture could cause it to explode, handing over victory to its rivals on a silver platter.
Interestingly, Emm-erson Mnangagwa, the party’s secretary for legal affairs; Joice Mujuru, the party’s second secretary and vice president and Saviour Kasukuwere, the party’s secretary for youth have all distanced themselves from the jostling to succeed President Mugabe after reports had linked them to the warring factions.
Mnangagwa was lat-er to be quoted last week saying he was ready to rule. He is said to be disputing the report and has begun taking legal action against the weekly publication that carried the story.
Reports had swirled before the politburo meeting that a certain mining house had dished out wads of United States dollar bills to the tune of US$75 000 per individual to certain ZANU-PF cadres to influence them to speak out strongly in favour of certain agendas that were expected to come up for discussion.
These reports could not be verified.
There was also talk of trying to bring back Simba Makoni and Dumiso Dabe-ngwa, the former ZANU-PF politburo members who turned their backs on the party in February 2008 to form Mavambo/Kusile/Da-wn party after being fed up with the party’s failure to renew itself.
Those mulling bringing back Dabengwa and Makoni believe their coming back could strengthen ZANU-PF and enhance its chances of winning the next polls against the Movement for Democratic Change party headed by Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai.
The DCC polls were not the only headache the politburo grappled with yesterday. There was also the issue of the constitution-making process which has taken unnecessarily long to produce a draft constitution that should be presented for a referendum.
Again, there was no decision on the issue by the time of going to print.
Accusations and counter accusation have however, being flying between ZANU-PF’s Constitution Parlia-mentary Select Committee point-man, Paul Mangwana and Jonathan Moyo, the sharp-tongued politburo member who shadows the constitution-making process.
When contacted for comment as the paper went to bed at around 8:45pm, Rugare Gumbo (pictured), the ZANU-PF national spokes-person, could not do so since the meeting was still in progress.
“Shamu has been tasked to go to the provinces to assess DCC elections. He has been asked to nullify those elections deemed to be irregular province by province,” said a source.
“COPAC was also given 10 days to produce an accetable draft,” added the source.