The Sunday News
Vusumuzi Dube Sunday News Reporter
PRESIDENT Mugabe on Friday threw his weight behind South Africa’s ruling party, the African National Congress (ANC), saying the revolutionary party should win this year’s elections as it had the people’s well-being at heart.
The President made these remarks while touring the South African Department of Trade and Industry stand during the Zimbabwe International Trade Fair (ZITF), amid ululations and chants from the South African delegation that was manning the stand.
“ANC must win, that is the revolutionary party and izawina kuphela, amandla ngawethu. We, therefore, wish you all the luck in your upcoming elections.
“Do not forget we want you to come and invest in Zimbabwe, this is also your country,” said President Mugabe to the delegation, attracting further cheers from them.
President Mugabe’s backing of ANC is no surprise as in 2012 the ANC also declared that it wanted Zanu-PF to win the 2013 elections.
Cde Gwede Mantashe, the ANC secretary-general, told delegates at the Zanu-PF conference in Bulawayo that his party was willing to assist in coming up with election messages and strategies that would deliver victory for the ruling party.
“It is important for Zanu-PF to regain lost ground and continue to represent the aspirations of the people of Zimbabwe,” Cde Mantashe said then.
The ANC and Zanu-PF share an ideological commitment to African self-determination which dates back to the days of the liberation struggle and to this day that commitment makes the relationship between the two revolutionary political parties unbreakable.
After Zimbabwe gained independence, its successive Governments went out of their way to help the ANC undo apartheid.
The Zanu-PF Governments provided safe houses for members of the ANC and other freedom fighters from South Africa. Some of the most known and respected names in ANC history such as President Thabo Mbeki at one stage or another used Zimbabwe as a safe haven or to transport arms.
Given this history of the two revolutionary parties, it comes as no shock that ANC and Zanu-PF are joined at the hip in terms of ideas and reforms.
Both see the need to empower their people, to adjust the land imbalance and restore sovereignty to their people.
It is this relationship that saw South Africa unyielding when the West was pushing for the ANC-led government to turn against Zimbabwe at the height of the Western created economic and political crisis.
Over the years South Africa has repeatedly blocked international attempts to have Zimbabwe on the United Nations agenda.
The UN Security Council at the instigation of America and Britain has sought to have Zimbabwe punished on trumped up charges of human rights violations.
The West, led by the two countries, is against Zimbabwe’s empowerment policies. At the height of the Zimbabwe crisis, when Britain wanted to wage war against Zimbabwe in a desperate effort to topple the President Mugabe led Government, the ANC through President Mbeki, came to Zimbabwe’s rescue as he stopped Britain from invading Zimbabwe.
President Mbeki made these startling revelations in November 2013. He said South Africa was under pressure from the UK to participate in a regime change scheme to depose President Mugabe and his Zanu-PF party, a move which Pretoria rejected. “There is a retired chief of the British armed forces (Lord Charles Guthrie). . . he had to withstand pressure from the then prime minister of the United Kingdom Tony Blair . . . who was saying to the chief of the British armed forces, ‘you must work out a military plan so that we can physically remove Robert Mugabe’.
“We knew that because we had come under the same pressure that we need to co-operate and we were saying no,” said President Mbeki.
He criticised the manner in which Britain wanted to take the responsibility of choosing a leader for the people of Zimbabwe.
“. . .You are coming from London you say you don’t like Robert Mugabe for whatever reason, people in London don’t like him . . . we are going to remove him then you are going to put someone else in his place. Why does it become a British responsibility to decide who leads Zimbabwe,” he was quoted as saying.
President Mbeki helped broker the now defunct power sharing agreement between the Movement for Democratic Change parties and Zanu-PF following a disputed election in 2008.
President Jacob Zuma who took over from President Mbeki later became the mediator between the three political parties in the Government of National Unity which expired following Zanu-PF’s emphatic election victory in July 2013.
During the tour of ZITF stands, President Mugabe also visited the Kenya Export Promotion Council, Embassy of Indonesia, Namibian Port, Embassy of Namibia and the Congo Brazzaville stands where he encouraged them to invest in the country.
