Succession Race: Evolving liability for Mujuru, Mnangagwa?

By Allen Hungwe

Given the deplorable state of opposition politics in Zimbabwe, it looks like the only political game in town is inside ZANU-PF. That game is all about the prospects, perspectives and speculation around the race to succeed President Robert Mugabe when he finally comes out of active politics.

Unlike a year or so ago, every evolving narrative inside ZANU-PF is viewed through the lenses of this bruising succession race, and may be rightfully so.

Claims have also been made of how state institutions have now been seized with the interest in the succession contest. Over time, and with prospects of the succession race expected to climax at the party’s December 2014 congress, there seems to have been major shifts and changes.

In the past, it was simply an issue of pitting what is perceived to the pro-Joice Mujuru group against the pro-Emmerson Mnangagwa group.

Analysis around succession was simplistic and merely premised on drawing the line between these two groups and then allotting all other party members to either side. There were also open and clear clashes between members of these two sides, with traceable links to the two supposed faction leaders, and anything else outside of that was simply a side-show.

This has since changed and continues to, as we approach the inviolable December congress. The succession race has progressively averted from being a direct confrontation between the perceived contenders to being targeted at their actual or perceived proxies. Whereas a lot of analysis has been based on pitting Mnangagwa and Mujuru in the past, that has somehow seized and there is more pre-occupation with “the fight of the proxies”.

This has led to an undeniable exportation of the confrontation expansively into other domains of the national socio-economic and political fabric. This is the reason why issues like the corruption exposures that raged the country this year have simply been seen as an extension of the succession race. The formation and appointments of parastatal boards and their management teams have in some cases, also been supposed on the succession dynamics.

The country’s management of the economy and its foreign relations have also been heavily regarded based on the succession tinge, and dependent on who is driving what programme and how they are perceived along these evasive succession allegiance lines.

The pressure has been lifted and transferred from what the individuality of Mujuru and Mnangagwa are about or what they desire to achieve, to being a broader battle fought along lines that I believe they both have not as much control as they have had in the past.

Mujuru and Mnangagwa are themselves becoming captured by the web spun from the race in which they are supposed to be the main contenders. Although it is their names that are progressed as the reasons behind the divisions and acrimony that have enveloped the party, they have diminishing influence on how the race is proceeding and on how their candidatures are being posed and poised.

They have merely become pawns in a game where the institutionalisation of the succession tussles has developed complex stakes that are much more than the individuality of the contenders. The evasiveness of the succession tussles where the centres of the contention have diffused from Mujuru and Mnangagwa’s direct control, poses a danger to the contenders themselves.

As they lose influence over succession processes that are being dispensed in their names, they will transform from being precursors to mere proxies of those who at one point were their mere supporters of followers. They therefore face major risks, of not only losing control of the direction of the succession race, but of being prisoners of their institutionalised factions.

Should any one of them succeed President Mugabe, am left wondering if they will become leaders, with as much clout and control as the president currently has?

Will the slippery control that Mujuru and Mnangagwa face in the succession race be an emerging risk that will become a liability should any of them take over from President Mugabe? The trail to leadership nearly always defines what type and kind of a leader one eventually transpires to be. Will the institutionalisation of the succession battle become the fault-line of President Mugabe’s successor, especially if it’s Mujuru or Mnangagwa?

The other case around the evasiveness of this succession tussle is really around how much both Mujuru and Mnangagwa are really in the race. Because we have seen the battle being more targeted at proxies or those assumed to be, I then wonder just how much the two quoted front runners are really in this game, or else they have just become convenient names to fight other issues, no matter how related or unrelated they are to the succession.

Are Mujuru and Mnangagwa’s ambitions for succession accurately represented by the levels of acrimony and desperation that we have seen being propelled by their proxies, supporters and followers? Do we not have an instance where the projected succession interests that are being peddled by the faction supporters are much more concerted than what actually resides with the supposed contenders?

Mnangagwa has been extremely quiet on succession issues and it has become difficult to tell just how much appetite and hunger he has in this succession tussle. For Mujuru, her vice president position and her usual fill-in duties whenever President Mugabe is away, has also created some induced perception that she is critically preparing herself for succession.

It is, however, not evident just how much each of these front runners really want the presidency at the expense of all the risks that come with the clutter which the succession battle has now accrued over time? There are rumours around how Mnangagwa may be considering pulling out of this race and how others are being lined up to replace his now idolised candidacy. This may simply be one of those notorious Harare rumours, but it presents an opportunity for reflection.

If this is by any chance true, then it could really be a case of how the protracted, evasive and fast mutating succession race is claiming the perceived faction contenders as its main victims. This succession race has become too prolonged, and along the way it has gathered so much momentum that its direction, control and focus has become too institutionalised.

It does not rest under the control of individuals anymore but of institutionalised behaviours and interests. I have a premonition about how in the long run, either options between Mujuru and Mnangagwa may somehow phase out.

In the end the options for succession may either be President Mugabe extending his leadership beyond the 2014 congress or another “dark horse” or compromise candidate emerging. With such a reality, is the succession race not evolving to be a liability to those who are otherwise expected to benefit from it — Mujuru and Mnangagwa? Financial Gazette