Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe addresses a meeting of the ZANU-PF Central Committee in Harare Sept. 8, 2017. Mugabe said on Friday the recently launched coalition of opposition parties is fragile and will be resoundingly beaten by his ruling ZANU-PF party in next year's general elections. (Xinhua/Stringer)
HARARE, Sept. 8 (Xinhua) -- Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe said Friday the recently launched coalition of opposition parties is fragile and will be resoundingly beaten by his ruling ZANU-PF party in next year's general elections.
Addressing a ZANU-PF central committee meeting, Mugabe said one firm "blow" from the ruling party would dismantle the seven-party Movement for Democratic Change Alliance (MDC Alliance) led by Morgan Tsvangirai.
"Fortunately for ZANU-PF, these political parties are as divided as ever, fighting over leadership positions. We know that they are creatures of the West, whose sole purpose is to dislodge ZANU-PF from power," the state-run news agency New Ziana quoted Mugabe as saying.
Mugabe dismissed the opposition coalition, saying the secret to his party's victory in previous elections lied in its appeal to the people and the fact that it was people-oriented.
Mugabe reiterated his call for unity in ZANU-PF and urged party leadership to start mobilizing people for the voter registration process and ensure they vote for ZANU-PF in next year's polls.
"As we go into next year's elections, we cannot solely hope to win by riding on sheer popularity of our party, we have to make preparations to ensure victory is certain, we must galvanize the electorate to go and vote for us en-masse," he said.
Zimbabwe is using the Bio-Metric Voter Registration system for the first time and all voters, new and old, are required to register to be able to cast their vote in the polls.
Mugabe said party leaders should refrain from insulting and taking each other to court if offended, saying this was setting a bad precedent for youth in the party.
He lauded Zimbabweans for their resilience in the wake of sanctions which have worsened economic hardships in the country and called on Zimbabweans to continue working hard to overcome the challenges.
"The West, the European Union in particular, is not about to remove its illegal sanctions against us anytime soon, no, but that should not dampen our revolutionary spirit. We remain firm and where we stand, we shall continue to stand," he said.
The president said Zimbabwe was on its way to restoring its status as southern Africa's bread basket after recording a bumper maize harvest in the 2016/17 summer cropping season.
"I have no doubt in my mind that with the support we are giving our farmers coupled with the farming skills and experience they have acquired so far, another bumper harvest is guaranteed next year," he said.
