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Brian Chitemba
ZAPU is on a collision course with the police in Bulawayo tomorrow when the party holds jubilee celebrations marking the 50th anniversary of the party as law enforcement agents have threatened to cut short the event.
Zapu spokesman Methuseli Moyo said about 35 000 delegates would gather at Barbourfields Stadium from morning until midnight, but police had ordered the party to assemble only up to 4pm.
He said they had received correspondence from the police notifying the party of the approved timelines of the event.
Zapu was formed by the late former vice-president Joshua Nkomo in 1961 and spearheaded the fight against colonialism together with its offshoot Zanu leading to Indepedence from Britain in 1980.
Zapu was eventually collapsed into Zanu PF on December 22 1987 when Nkomo signed a unity accord with President Robert Mugabe’s party.
Former Zipra intelligence chief and Zanu PF politburo heavyweight Dumiso Dabengwa and the late Thenjiwe Lesabe pulled out of Zanu PF in 2009 to revive Zapu citing Mugabe’s misrule.
Moyo said his party was not happy with the police’s stance to impose timelines of the celebrations saying Zanu PF held a 22-hour unity gig at White City Stadium last weekend.
“We are made to suffer because we are opposition. We are definitely not happy at all about the time given by the police. Why shouldn’t we be allowed to finish at our own time just as Zanu PF did on Saturday?” queried Moyo.
Some Zapu officials believe that police were likely to clash with party supporters drawn from across the country if they attempted to break up the celebrations.
Zapu is at loggerheads with Zanu PF which it accuses of orchestrating the Gukurahundi massacres in the 1980s.
“Today, we declare that the people’s grief and suffering was not in vain. Their Zapu is back, and back for good,” said Moyo.
Zapuinvited other southern African liberation movements such as the ANC, MPLA, Frelimo and Swapo and governments and political parties from neighbouring states for the gig.
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