Zanu PF in 6s and 7s as Women’s League turned knife on Grace




Prisca Mupfumira
Spread the love

FIRED former Public Service minister Prisca Mupfumira took advantage of the Zanu PF politburo on Wednesday to launch a blistering attack on Grace, accusing President Robert Mugabe’s wife of being ungrateful.

Mupfumira was sacked from her job along with three other ministers after President Robert Mugabe’s Cabinet shake-up early this week.

She, however, hit back during a sitting of the ruling party’s politburo coming eye-ball to eyeball with the powerful Women’s League secretary, according to sources.

“She was aggressive and challenged Grace without holding back. Mupfumira told Grace that she was turning against people who helped her ascend to power. Mupfumira said Grace was ungrateful arguing she had worked hard to convince former women’s league boss and Water Affairs minister Oppah Muchinguri to relinquish her party position for her.

“She told the First Lady that she was running the women’s league and the party based on rumour mongering,” the sources said.

Muchinguri and Mupfumira are reportedly part of Vice President Emmerson Mnangagwa’s Team Lacoste faction that is engaged in a bitter power tussle with the G40 faction. The G40 faction boats of support from both Mugabe and his wife.

Muchinguri reportedly jumped to Mupfumira’s side arguing she had been arm-twisted by a group of senior party women known as “golden oldies” who include Senate President Edna Madzongwe.

When Grace was catapulted to lead the Zanu PF women’s league in 2014, it was claimed she had been “persuaded” and accepted grudgingly to take up the position that thrust her into the vortex of Zanu PF’s ragging succession fights.

Mnangagwa and his acolytes in the Lacoste faction have been under pressure with Grace baying for the VP’s head demanding that he be sacked from the party for fanning divisions.

Mnangagwa has watched his allies in the youth league and the war veterans section of the party pruned systematically over the past few years since the 2014 congress.

Grace is part of the G40n faction that includes national commissar Saviour Kasukuwere as well as Higher Education minister Jonathan Moyo who was the subject of a presentation by Mnangagwa at the politburo meeting.

Mnangagwa was responding to a similar presentation by Moyo in which the Zanu PF secretary for Science and Technology accused the VP of plotting to unseat Mugabe through the capture of State institutions.

Moyo is haunted by a case being investigated by the Anti-Corruption Commission. A few months ago, he was almost arrested before he was protected by Mugabe and his wife.

Grace has argued the investigation into Moyo’s alleged abuse of over $400 000 in Zimbabwe Manpower Development Fund (Zimdef) resources was a factional agenda. – NewZim