HARARE – Christopher Mutsvangwa says Zanu PF leadership rival Kudakwashe Tagwirei is “not ready” to be a senior leader in Zanu PF, and has suggested that he enrols with the party’s ideology school to learn more about the organisation and its history.
Mutsvangwa spoke in the wake of the millionaire businessman’s clumsy attempt to be elevated into the central committee, the party’s key decision making body between congresses.
The businessman’s actions displayed “uninformed ambition,” Mutsvangwa claimed.
Tagwirei, who made his fortune from state contracts and remains Zanu PF’s largest donor has entered frontline politics by accepting a recommendation by Harare province for his co-option into the Zanu PF central committee.
The Sakunda Holdings founder attended a meeting of the central committee on July 3 but was kicked out, allegedly on the orders of vice president Constantino Chiwenga.
Zanu PF officials later explained that Tagwirei needed the recommendation by Harare province to be ratified by the central committee first, before he becomes a member. As it turned out, the item on endorsing new members was not on the agenda and so Tagwirei should wait for the next meeting – three months away.
Mutsvangwa, the Zanu PF spokesman who wears his heart on his sleeve, has never hidden his dislike of Tagwirei, who intends to use his financial muscle to force his way into contention as one of the potential successors of President Emmerson Mnangagwa, whose second and final term ends in 2028.
Reflecting on Tagwirei’s embarrassing removal from the central committee meeting, Mutsvangwa said the process is that the party’s hierarchy first deliberates and endorses a new member before they take their seat in the central committee.
“Whether it was for lack of proper advice from the Harare provincial leadership or personal ambition, he (Tagwirei) assumed it would be a headlong stampede,” Mutsvangwa told The Standard.
“It was procedurally wrong and the
constitution had to be read out to him that ‘you are not yet a member and that you are coming into an institution with principles and guidelines’.”
Mutsvangwa suggested that Tagwirei may have to start from the party’s grassroots, instead of parachuting into the top structures of the organisation.
The decision to attend the central committee when he was not a member is “behaviour that creates its own problems because it flouts the constitution, the party guiding principles and tenets,” Mutsvangwa said.
He added: “It shows that you’re not ready to be part of it and you may have to go back and understand where you are.
“He wanted to know the power he was assuming, not the mode to exercise that power. Without that faux pas, the process
would have taken its due course. It brings with it an element of bad faith or uninformed ambition.
“This ignorance or naivety indicates
that his beginning should be the Chitepo School of Ideology. The tenets of the party are concretised in its constitution and if you are coming in you have to relate accordingly.”
Tagwirei is part of a group of businessmen that Chiwenga has labelled zvigananda – politically-connected businessmen who have corrupted the state’s procurement system to enrich themselves and their associates to the detriment of the country’s economy.
The thought of Tagwirei succeeding Mnangagwa unites some of the party’s bitter rivals like Chiwenga and Mutsvangwa.
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