Paul Nyathi

President Emmerson Mnangagwa has added his voice to ZANU PF assertions that the two groups of South African envoys were never meant to meet with anyone else in the country other than himself and ZANU PF party.

Mnangagwa, who was addressing ZANU PF Midlands Provincial Coordinating Committee (PCC) members in Gweru on Saturday, also dismissed chances of the opposition political parties meeting with the South Africans in future.

He said the first group sent by President Cyril Ramaphosa was for “President-to-President briefings” while that country’s ruling African National Congress (ANC) delegation had come for “party-to-party briefings” and were never meant to meet opposition groupings as has been peddled on various forums.

Mnangagwa said the country was under siege from its detractors, a development that saw President Ramaphosa of South Africa, telephoning him.

He said the personal call from President Ramaphosa led to the dispatching of an envoy and later a recent visit by a delegation from the ruling ANC.

“President Ramaphosa, my friend, he called and said ‘my brother, there is a lot of pressure here, how are things over there because here we understand Zimbabwe is in a crisis’ and I said ‘no there is nothing like that’ and he said ‘I want to send an envoy to be briefed’ and I said ‘ok’.

“Then social media misinterprets, they say ah President Ramaphosa is sending an envoy to come and investigate the Zimbabwe situation and he must come and see other groups and so on. No.

“The protocol is if a Head of State sends an envoy to another Head of State, the envoy carries the information from one Head to another and the other replies and that reply is carried back and that is what happened. It’s a President to President briefing,” Mnangagwa said.

He said revolutionary parties have a symbiotic relationship.

“Then there are revolutionary parties. In Mozambique we have Frelimo, in South Africa we have the ANC, we have SWAPO in Namibia, Angola’s MPLM, Zimbabwe’s ZANU-PF and we also have Chamachamapinduzi in Tanzania. These are the parties that were engaged in the armed struggle.

“We have, of course, countries like Botswana, Zambia and Malawi. So we have a forum of revolutionary parties where we continue to share challenges as revolutionary parties. As we get attacked by our detractors we must share the mode of attack by our detractors. So, we agreed as ANC and ZANU PF that our brothers and sisters of the ANC come and we discuss the challenges and attacks on us so they also prepare themselves better,” said Mnangagwa.

He said there was never a plan for the ANC to meet other opposition outfits.

“You then hear some sections of the media saying the South African envoy and the ANC delegation snubbed opposition parties, no, they were never meant to meet them,” the President said.

Source: State Media