The Sunday Mail
Vukani Madoda The Sharpshooter
You have to give it to Professor Jonathan Moyo. He has a knack for stealing the limelight. He has a way of sowing seeds of confusion.
The manner in which he grabbed headlines last Friday proves that Zanu-PF has its hands full ahead of next year’s harmonised elections. “Looking forward to this engagement. It will be no holds barred!” he tweeted just before attending the Sapes Trust Policy Dialogue Forum billed “Whiter the Nationalist Project in Zimbabwe?”
And, indeed he had a field-day ravaging Vice-President Emmerson Mnangagwa with regards to the ever-controversial Presidential succession debate. While most of us were gleefully watching the unfolding catastrophe of the so-called grand coalition, where Queen Bee went to Ghana to declare herself Presidential candidate ahead of 14 “serious” leaders of the opposition, the professor just had to snatch the microphone. While many of us were still wondering whom the “serious” opposition Presidential candidates were as alluded to by Wananchi, the good old professor would have none of it and stole the limelight.
Prof Moyo just had to do it. If it had only been an attack on the perceived Presidential aspirations and seniority of Cde Mnangagwa it may have been worth viewing the tirade as Prof Moyo’s usual disruptive posturing and argumentative nature. However, to go a step further and introduce Cde Sydney Sekeramayi as the person best suited to succeed Cde Mugabe was too unsettling to ignore.
Given the litany of superlatives that were used to describe Cde Sekeramayi, one would think Prof Moyo was already the chief cheerleader of a Sekeramayi-led Government that does not exist. “One of them, by way of an important example, is Dr Sydney Sekeramayi whose loyalty to President Mugabe, the party and country; whose liberation credentials, experience, consensus-style of leadership, stature, commitment to the nationalist project and humility have no match,” said Prof Moyo, who apparently recently discovered that he is in love with Cde Sekeramayi.
That kind of cheerleading is an obviously disruptive agenda that seeks to stoke chaos in Zanu-PF. It smacks of the antics of Energy Mutodi, who gets his knickers into a twist as he tries to wax lyrical about Cde Mnangagwa. I do not think it is healthy to start having uninvited kingmakers when there clearly is no vacancy for the throne. The disruption caused by these self-proclaimed kingmakers like Mutodi and Moyo presents an opportunity for the opposition to capitalise on disunity and it discredits the ruling party.
None of us have ever heard Cde Sekeramayi declare that he wants to be President or that he is offering himself to succeed Cde Mugabe. None of us have ever heard Cde Mnangagwa declare his Presidential ambitions, and in fact all we hear from him is his support for President Mugabe.
Or is it that Prof Moyo is slyly trying to get Cde Sekeramayi into factional trouble while claiming to love him so much? Is it that Mutodi is trying to drag Cde Mnangagwa into a mess while professing to be his foremost supporter? We do not need to find ourselves debating who is more senior between Cde Mnangagwa and Cde Sekeramayi just because Prof Moyo woke up in his best of destructive moods.
Our future cannot be determined by inadequate kingmakers who speak on behalf of people who want nothing to do with them.
This is what we call disruption. It is, therefore, significantly imprudent for Prof Moyo to introduce that kind of commotion within the ruling party. If Jonso has an axe to grind with Cde Mnangagwa, it is a bit unfair to drag Cde Sekeramayi or Zanu-PF into his disruptive fray. It smacks of disruption, indiscipline and political tactlessness.
If Jonono has presidential ambitions, let him speak for himself otherwise may he forever hold his peace.
Dubulaizitha!
