Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe on Thursday ruled out any regime change in his country as he opened his ruling Zanu-PF party congress which is due to renew the party’s top leadership.
The 80-year-old head of state, who has led the southern African country since independence in 1980, said the country had remained unified in the face of attempts by British Prime Minister Tony Blair to effect a regime change through the backing of ”stooge parties”.
Mugabe accuses the former colonial ruler of working with the opposition Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) to illegally remove Zimbabwe’s current government from power.
”Regime change Mr Blair, who are you to talk of regime change in Zimbabwe?” Mugabe asked in his opening address to the Zimbabwe African National Union-Patriotic Front party congress.
”Let there be regime change in Britain, we will not talk about it, but here, never ever.
”Zimbabwe is for Zimbabweans and only Zimbabweans can determine who shall rule them or not,” he said to loud applause from party members.
Mugabe spoke to some 9 000 delegates including about 100 foreign visitors from about 20 countries, all of whom gave solidarity messages in support of the long time ruler, his party and government.
The congress, held every five years, will see Mugabe re-elected to run the party until 2009 and is also set to elect a new vice-president, widely held to be the likely successor to Mugabe when his current term expires in 2008.
Vice-President Joseph Msika scoffed at calls for Mugabe to step down from office saying he should continue to rule until he is ”walking with the aid of a walking stick”.
”They say you should leave and give way to others. To us that is a luxury we cannot afford. We don’t know whether God will give us another Mugabe or a traitor who will sell away our country,” said Msika.
Mugabe predicted that the opposition Movement for Democratic Change would not last long, saying ”unity… has continued to energise us even as our external and internal enemies have been vigorously seeking their dream of regime change.
”They come and go, these stooge parties, and just now the way is very clear to the extinction of yet another opposition party.”
”We are proud that we are meeting as a united Zimbabwean party, leading a united Zimbabwean people that believe in themselves,” Mugabe said.
”Our enemies and detractors have failed to destroy this identity, even as they resort to various machinations, including the formation of stooge opposition parties,” he charged.
He slammed MDC leader Morgan Tsvangirai over his European tour to rally support for his party, accusing him of wasting time instead of campaigning back home for next year’s parliamentary elections.
The five-day congress, which is being held in the capital Harare, is expected to choose a woman vice-president for the first time in the country’s 24-year history.
The congress comes a day after six senior ruling party officials were suspended and Information Minister Jonathan Moyo reprimanded for organising a meeting that allegedly aimed to scupper party efforts to elect Water Resources Minister Joyce Mujuru as vice-president.
”We wonder why some amongst us should seek to depart from agreed democratic positions allowing their ambitions to mislead them,” Mugabe said.
Thousands of Zanu-PF members and senior officials crammed the Harare International Conference Centre for the congress, which was festooned with banners slamming the opposition and Britain.
Among the groups that sent solidarity messages were ruling and opposition parties from South Africa, Malawi, Zambia, Portugal, Libya, Democratic Republic of Korea, Tunisia, Botswana and pro-Mugabe groups from the United States and Britain. – Sapa-AFP