Msika backtracks over war threats

By Tichaona Sibanda
20 June 2008

Vice-president Joseph Msika recently left Zanu-PF officials stunned when he backtracked on his earlier threats to take up arms if Robert Mugabe lost the presidential run-off against MDC leader Morgan Tsvangirai.

Addressing Zanu-PF district officials in Kuwadzana, Msika downplayed threats that he and Mugabe had made, that they would not accept defeat and would rather go back to war.

Our Harare correspondent Simon Muchemwa told us Msika was supposed to have addressed a rally in Kuwadzana, but it was cancelled at the last minute due to a poor turnout. He ended up just addressing party district officials.

Apparently annoyed by the poor turnout Msika said that if they couldn’t organise a rally how on earth could they successfully organise people to go back into the bush.

Muchemwa said; ‘In fact he suprised everyone at the meeting by asking why war veterans wanted to go back to the bush.’

‘Who are you going to fight. Who is the enemy because no one has threatened us (government). Tsvangirai doesn’t have an army, so by going back to war we are actually going to be fighting our own people.’

Muchemwa said the vice-president’s outburst left many in the audience stunned, because a few days earlier he had used threatening war language at a rally in Zaka, Masvingo province, where he had said that voting for the MDC was akin to voting for war as ‘trouble will start if whites take advantage of that’.
The war threats have been denounced by various regional and world leaders, with some Western countries considering taking further action against Mugabe if he continues to threaten the outcome of the forthcoming poll.
The MDC has said the orgy of violence against its supporters has seen over 80 people killed and over 3000 hospitalized. Tsvangirai has in the last week been detained several times and all his rallies have been cancelled by the police.