Chipanga can go hang: War vets
THE Christopher Mutsvangwa-led executive of the Zimbabwe National Liberation War Veterans (ZNLWVA) yesterday scoffed at Zanu PF youth leader Kudzanai Chipanga’s threats to bar them from attending President Robert Mugabe’s youth interface rally at White City Stadium on Saturday.
ZNLWVA Bulawayo provincial chairperson Cephas Ncube said only Mugabe could bar them from attending the rally, dismissing Chipanga as a political greenhorn.
“We follow the revolution not individuals. In this case, we follow Zanu PF the revolutionary party and we cannot be told by misguided individuals whether we must attend Mugabe’s rally or not,” he said.
“We did not join Zanu PF like Chipanga, we have been in Zanu PF for years. It is in our blood and we, therefore, cannot be told by a kid now that we must not attend Zanu PF gatherings.
“The Zanu PF youth league must concern itself about issues surrounding the youths, not war veterans. Mutsvangwa is our leader. He was elected at our congress and until then and the next congress, no one can then say Mutsvangwa’s team is renegade. They are the ones who have gone rogue.”
Chipanga last week declared that Mutsvangwa’s “group of renegade war veterans” were not welcome to the rally.
“As the youth league, we work with the women’s league. You can’t separate the youths from the women. We work together and they will be joining us during the interface. We are also inviting the main wing. We also work with war veterans, ex-detainees and collaborators in our programmes,” he said.
“There are, however, those rogue war veterans like Mutsvangwa and crew, who insult the First Family and senior party leaders. Those ones are not invited. They must remain in the cold until they repent. We only want real war veterans.”
The Zanu PF youths support a rebel war veteran’s faction with links to First Lady Grace, which had, until last week, been battling to wrest control of the ZNLWVA from Mutsvangwa’s executive before the High Court confirmed the latter as the legitimate leadership of the association.
The High Court ordered the rebel faction fronted by Patrick Nyaruwata and George Mlala to stop using the ZNLWVA name or masquerading as war veterans’ leaders.
By NQOBANI NDLOVU
