HARARE: Zimbabwe’s ruling party yesterday wrapped up a key congress once again anointing veteran President Robert Mugabe as party leader and putting his wife Grace on a path to follow him into power.
“I want to thank you profoundly for once again choosing me to lead you,” Mugabe told the thousands of cheering supporters at the ZANU-PF’s elective congress. “I know where I come from... I am not greater than the people who gave birth to me,” said the 90-year-old who has been in power in Zimbabwe since independence from Britain in 1980.
The congress also elected his wife 49-year-old Grace to head the party’s powerful women’s wing, which would put her higher among the contenders to succeed Mugabe. She had won a surprise nomination in August to lead the women’s league and has made no secret of her ambition to clinch the southern African country’s top job.
For now her husband plans to hold onto that position as party delegates also chose Mugabe to stand as the ZANU-PF candidate in the next elections in 2018. When Mugabe announced his wife’s new role in the party yesterday it was met with tepid applause that led party chairman Simon Khaya Moyo to exhort the crowd to cheer louder.
Grace Mugabe had waged a fierce campaign for the women’s league post, which also puts her on the party’s steering committee, disparaging her rivals including Vice-President Joice Mujuru whom she has accused of corruption and even plotting to assassinate her husband. AFP
