Controversial former war veterans leader Jabulani Sibanda says President Mugabe is struggling to keep Zanu PF intact.
He said it is not surprising that some factions – one calling itself Team Lacoste allegedly led by Emmerson Mnangagwa and the other Generation 40 backing First Lady Grace Mugabe to succeed her husband - are fighting for the control of the party.
Sibanda noted that there is nothing that these factions are fighting for as Zanu PF is now in tatters.
“There is nothing to grab ... There is nothing to grab, now it’s a disappointing issue to be a president or to be in the presidency of Zanu PF or the governing party. I don’t see them (factions) changing their attitudes or their modus operandi in a short space of time. I don’t see that. So, there is nothing to inherit there (in Zanu PF).”
Sibanda, who was expelled from the ruling party after he claimed that First Lady Grace Mugabe had staged a bedroom coup, said Team Lacoste and Generation 40 are hopeless groups of people.
He had no kind words to Generation 40. “I wonder if there is somebody who is 40 among that generation or there was somebody who was 40 three years ago and remained 40 two years ago, remained 40 last year, remains 40 today and will be 40 next year it’s impossible. So, that organization represents something that is unknown to Zanu PF, unknown to our culture, unknown to our country.
“So, these two the Lacoste … The Lacoste is something that we don’t know, it’s foreign … that is a fashion or style. We don’t know what it is. But whatever these two things are what they have managed to do is to drop the living standards in our country where people are unemployed, where tribalism works so much that people are now divided on tribal lines and if you go to our hospitals there is no medicine.”
Sibanda further said there is no way that the two factions will heed President Mugabe’s calls for unity in the party.
Mr. Mugabe made the call after war veterans said to be backing Mnangagwa were forcibly dispersed from the streets in Harare by the police recently.
Sibanda said the war veterans won’t heed the president calls for unity.