President Emmerson Mnangagwa is facing resistance from within his Zanu PF colleagues over his Political Representatives Dialogue (Polad) initiative, with some senior figures allegedly viewing the platform as a money-gobbling talk show that produces no tangible results, NewsDay has learnt.
Mnangagwa created the first Bolad party after the hotly contested 2018 elections seeking legitimacy after his main rival Nelson Chamisa dismissed the election as rigged despite the collapse of his court case.
Mnangagwa has pampered the political leaders, who together received less than 3% of the national vote in the 2018 presidential election, with top-of-the-line Isuzu D-Max cars and huge suits.
Just a month after his second and again disputed election, Mnangagwa invited the losing candidates to a second roundtable meeting as part of his move to mollify his critics in the wake of disputed elections in August that were widely viewed by domestic and international observers as neither free nor fair.
In his state-controlled newspaper column, Mnangagwa said Boulad worked well in his previous administration.
“I intend to reframe the dialogue of political actors, Bolad. This has served us remarkably well in the past five years, helping us find each other across the political divide and thus collectively envision policies for our nation. To this end, I will invite leaders of all political parties who have participated in Coordinated elections that have just ended, so that together we reshape the framework in order to make it more responsive and more able to serve the times and our nation,” he said.
He added: “I am confident that my call will be welcomed by most, if not all, political parties. Partisan politics should never stand in the way, or make us deaf to the call to work together for the collective good of our people and our nation. Zimbabwe is our country together.” “.
However, nine months after Mnangagwa took power, Boulad has not yet conceived.
In an interview yesterday, Mnangwa’s spokesman, George Charamba, said the president remains committed to the dialogue platform.
The President has committed to the dialogue platform. However, he only indicated that he does not oppose the political dialogue program, but when and in what shape or form it becomes his prerogative.”
However, sources, who spoke to NewsDay since last week, claimed that there are people in Zanu PF who view Polad as a useless platform given that the ruling party controls a large majority in Parliament.
“Most of the presidential candidates in the recent elections did not get large numbers and do not have influential political capital, so there is no need to waste taxpayers’ money on the programme,” a senior Zanu PF official said.
However, the source said Mnangagwa has ignored calls to abandon the platform and is continuing with plans to bring it back.
“he [Mnangagwa] He feels the platform is good for political optics and is going ahead with the initiative. He was supposed to meet other Boulad managers immediately after the independence celebrations, but the problem is that the preacher, Boulad secretariat head Virginia Mabhiza, is always out of the country.
“Most of the presidential candidates were in Murambinda during independence [Day] The source said that they are waiting to set a date to meet the president.
Yesterday, Mabhiza asked for written questions, but he did not respond.
Meanwhile, observers said Boulad is a useless platform because Mnangagwa always rejects most proposals from other managers.
In 2022, Peter Munyanduri was fired from Boulad after criticizing the Mnangagwa administration.
Presidential candidate Wilbert Mubaiwa recently said that if Mnangagwa is serious about Bolad, he should amend the constitution.
“I have not thought about joining Boulad. I will cross that bridge when I get there. However, I think Boulad serves no purpose because there are no laws to support it.”
However, Boulad members of the last Mnangagwa administration say they saved the government from complete economic collapse after Mnangagwa, through the Ministry of Finance and the Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe, implemented their proposals.
Presidential candidate Trust Chikuhura, who was one of Bolad’s members, said the economic summit they organized in 2020 provided solutions to turn around Zimbabwe’s stifling economy.
Chikohura also said that the Pulad Indaba currency retained in 2022 also helped stabilize the country’s defunct Zimdollar currency. Newsday
