ZANU PF has said it will crush the secessionist Mthwakazi Republic Party (MRP) after the latter claimed it had set up borders in the country.
Speaking at the start of the three-day Herbert Chitepo School of Ideology orientation workshop for mayors and chairpersons from the country’s 92 local authorities in Harare yesterday, Zanu PF national political commissar Munyaradzi Machacha said the secessionist party had declared war against Zimbabwe.
“We cannot negotiate our defence, our security and preservation of Zimbabwean unity. Internal peace and security is not negotiable and interference in our internal affairs, these are non-negotiable,” Machacha said.
“The Mthwakazi, those young boys, setting their borders here in Zimbabwe is unacceptable, partitioning the country, splitting it into smaller States. That will be totally unacceptable. Anyone trying to do that is declaring war on the State and the State will descend on them.”
Mthwakazi is the traditional name of the proto-Ndebele people and Ndebele kingdom and is in the area of today’s Zimbabwe and is widely used to refer to inhabitants of Matabeleland region.
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MRP, however, seeks to revive the State called Mthwakazi, which was there before the colonisation of Rhodesia that combined Mthwakazi and Mashonaland.
At yesterday’s workshop, council officials, including town clerks and chief executive officers, were ordered to sign in a register as everyone invited was expected to attend.
The workshop was spiced with the revolutionary songs popular during the country’s war of liberation.
Machacha, the leader of Herbert Chitepo School of Ideology, said the institution was no longer a Zanu PF project, but a national programme.
He said after the local authorities, the indoctrination would be extended to lecturers at Zimbabwe’s institutions of higher education.
Machacha said political parties in Zimbabwe, including Zanu PF, were riddled with divisions that needed to be nipped in the bud.
“We have noticed that there are disputes in both the ruling party and opposition parties. The sons of Zimbabwe are fighting against each other and in Zanu PF, there are frictions (which is) the same with the opposition,” Machacha said.
He said young people from both Zanu PF and the opposition also want power.
Machacha, however, threatened members of the opposition movements saying the ruling party would use its “muscle” to deal with them.
“Some of the strategies being used by the opposition leading to anarchy are not acceptable. We will see you as terrorists and we will apply muscles and we will use maximum power,” he posited.
“Do not sabotage the sitting government. If you have a strategy that counters our revolution, you will be in trouble.
“We should not do things that border on terrorism and things that do not respect the national interest of the country.”
Machacha said Zanu PF was aware of opposition activists who wanted to sabotage the recently-concluded Sadc Heads of State and Government Summit held at the New Parliament Building in Mt Hampden at the weekend.
Meanwhile, addressing the gathering, Local Government and Public Works minister Daniel Garwe said the meeting was not convened on partisan grounds.
“We are here as Zimbabwe and we are here to declare [our] aspirations as Zimbabweans to shape the way forward and those who are going to come after us 10 years later will see the benefit. We are not here for partisan politics,” he said.
“This is not a partisan project. This is a national programme. We are not here to facilitate allowances, but we are here for a national cause. We are here so that (after) three days, we are
better equipped to run our councils in a patriotic way and developmental manner.”
