The newly elected MDC youth leadership has threatened President Emmerson Mnangagwa’s administration with a series of imminent mass action over the deteriorating state of affairs in the country, declaring June, a month of radicalization.
Addressing press at the Morgan Tsvangirai House yesterday afternoon, MDC youth chair, Tererai Sithole said following a resolution by the party’s youth national council which set earlier in the day, the youth assembly will embark on mass mobilization of young people nationwide starting this month regardless of the government’s efforts to thwart demonstrations.
“We are not intimidated at all, they cannot shoot the entire nation, and as such we are declaring June a month of radicalization,”
‘We will not accept this rubbish, indeed this is rubbish, we said this to Robert Mugabe and today we say this to the man by the name Emmerson Mnangagwa, yes we are saying it to him. After our national Council today, we are putting the regime on notice, we shall soon be exercising our constitutional rights to express our displeasure on this mis-governance and cluelessness that has brought poverty on the people of Zimbabwe who can barely afford to buy basics to feed their families,”
“Our message to one, Mnangagwa is very clear, we are not going to respect bayonets and bullets but the voices of the downtrodden and the long suffering masses of Zimbabwe. We are definitely going to organize mass action and occupy the streets of Zimbabwe. The streets have become more comfortable than the poverty stricken homes,” said Sithole.
Earlier this year, the country witnessed a three day mass protest, dubbed “the shut-down” which resulted in severe damages to property estimated to worth tens of millions of dollars.
But the government quickly laid blame on the MDC, which the later strongly rebuked.
Since then, rumours of planned protests have attracted heavy security presence in major cities across the country while a new law awaiting finalization is set to draw parameters on how demonstrations will be conducted.
The Maintenance of Peace and Order (MOPO) Bill which succeeds the Public Order and Security Act (POSA) has so far divided opinion with critics labeling the bill, a replica of the old restrictive legislation.
“We will fight this in Parliament as a party and we will also exhaust all legal channels through the courts,” MDC Youth secretary general, Ostallos told 263Chat.
The development compounds pressure on President Mnangagwa who has resisted the main opposition leader, Nelson Chamisa’s call for dialogue under his terms prompting a litany of mass action threats since February.
Civil servants have not spared President Mnangagwa either.
Recently the Tripartite Negotiating Forum (TNF) bill was passed and is expected to be signed into law by President Mnangagwa forbiding civil servants from going on strike or demonstrating before engaging all stakeholders who include the government, captains of industry and Apex Council that brings together all workers’ unions.
