FIRST LADY Grace Mugabe yesterday demanded Vice-President Joice Mujuru resign immediately, accusing her of plotting a coup against President Robert Mugabe soon after her elevation in 2004.
EVERSON MUSHAVA
CHIEF REPORTER
Addressing a faction of war veterans and collaborators led by Joseph Chinotimba at a no-holds-barred “Final Push” meeting at her Mazowe Orphanage Home, Grace also seemingly endorsed Justice minister Emmerson Mnangagwa to take over the vice-presidency.
“I said (defence forces Commander General Constantine) Chiwenga should bring his firing squad and pump the bullets in me for defending my husband,” she said.
“These are the same people who in 2008 led the Bhora Musango campaign.
“Why do you want to remove Mugabe by force? This is a coup which they are planning.”
In her most unrestrained attack on Mujuru to date, she said the vice-president should have waited her turn, instead of trying to wrest power from her husband whom she says she is defending.
“Mnangagwa — that man I respect him,” she said.
“In 2004, he agreed to step down to allow Mujuru to take over when he had been voted by eight provinces.
- Chamisa under fire over US$120K donation
- Mavhunga puts DeMbare into Chibuku quarterfinals
- Pension funds bet on Cabora Bassa oilfields
- Councils defy govt fire tender directive
Keep Reading
“Likewise, like Mnangagwa, Mujuru should just do the honourable thing and resign.”
Mnangagwa is reportedly leading a faction battling with the Mujuru camp to succeed Mugabe, but both deny leading factions, insisting they support the president.
“It is not good to be fired,” she continued.
“It would be better if Mai Mujuru resigns today than wait to be fired by President Mugabe.”
Just before tearing into Mujuru’s private and public life, Grace pleaded with the vice-president’s sympathisers to leave the venue or risk suffering heart attacks.
Grace said Mujuru was ungrateful, power-hungry, daft, corrupt, foolish, divisive and a disgrace to Zimbabwe and the ruling Zanu PF.
She said Mujuru’s immediate resignation would save Mugabe the hassle of firing her.
Grace, who has viciously attacked Mujuru in public during her previous rallies since her recent nomination to lead Zanu PF’s women’s league, said the vice-president had no respect for the party’s leadership and was conniving with the opposition MDC and whites to reverse the gains of independence.
“If you are here and you support Mai Mujuru, you should immediately leave because what I am going to say will cause you diarrhoea, you should tie up your pants,” she said.
Grace claimed to have played a pivotal role in Mujuru’s elevation to the vice-presidency in 2004, but the former started snubbing her soon after and plotting Mugabe’s ouster.
“She has been working with the position MDC.
“That is why she has never chanted the slogan, ‘down with the MDC’. I told you that the MDC was formed in her house,” Grace said.
“Even after I have attacked her, look at how the opposition parties have sprung to her defence.”
She maintained that Mujuru was an extortionist and a hopeless politician who wanted to seize power, accsing the vice-president of usurping the country’s minerals, including gold and diamond claims.
Grace claimed that Mujuru had shares in several companies including a 10% shareholding in the privately-owned Daily News.
She claimed that Mujuru wanted to take all the diamonds through African Consolidated Resources (ACR), but the government blocked the alleged deal in 2006.
Just recently, Grace said, Mujuru brought an Arab investor and lied to her that she was running diamond mines through ACR.
“She was given money, maybe $10 million and that is the money she is using to buy people to unseat Mugabe,” Grace claimed.
She lashed out at Zanu PF Mashonaland East provincial chairman Ray Kaukonde and labelled him a pathetic Mujuru crony.
Grace said she did not care if people called her insane, as long as she has told the truth.
She said even if she was to be shot today, she would die with a smile on her face because she had exposed Mujuru.
To cap off her rally, Grace had the delegates excited when she said: “You are all possessed with Grace’s holy spirit; we exorcise demons in the name of Jesus”.
Grace claimed that Mujuru and Zanu PF MP for Marondera, Kaukonde, paid youths to disrupt her rallies in Manicaland and Mashonalad East provinces.
“I had been running Danhiko for years,” she said.
“Mujuru recently wrote me a praise-singing letter with a $10 000 enclosed in it. I refused it. I cannot be bought with money.
“She is now slim, yes, let her lose weight, I don’t care. They say I am a fool, but I just said, it’s okay, I’m a fool, but they will see.”
She also accused Mujuru of falsifying her liberation war credentials, insinuating she lied that she downed a helicopter during the war.
“All war veterans know what they did during the liberation war, not those who claim that they downed a chopper,” she said. “Let people say it than praising yourself, only to be disapproved by others.”
