Opposition youths demonstrate for transitional authority, petition AU and SADC

By Tatenda Dewa | Harare Bureau |

People’s Democratic Party (PDP) youths on Friday demonstrated in Harare in support of a National Transitional Authority (NTA) and later petitioned the African Union (AU) and the Southern African Development Community (SADC) to accept it as the only option to govern Zimbabwe.

The NTA, which PDP has actively lobbied for, for more than a year, seeks to have President Robert Mugabe and his cabinet removed and replaced with an outfit comprising technocrats and reputable personalities who would steer national affairs till the next elections in 2018.

The Mugabe establishment is being accused of running down the economy, human rights abuses and reluctance to introduce meaningful electoral reforms.

The petition was addressed to SADC heads of State, the Troika of the Organ on Politics, Defence and Security, the AU executive council, the AU judicial human rights institutions and the AU peace and security council.

The petition noted that the NTA was “the only way to save the Zimbabwe that Robert Mugabe and his cronies have ruined”.

“Concerned citizens of Zimbabwe hereby implore the African community to support the call for the stepping aside of Robert Mugabe and his coterie of looters, and allow a National Transitional authority to run the country in their stead,” read the petition that was signed by the PDP youth leader, Moses Manyengavana.

“Robert Mugabe and his Zanu PF are the source of Zimbabwe’s problems. The same people and structures which created the problems…cannot and will not be adequate or able to solve them,” noted the petition.

The PDP youth assembly accused the Mugabe government of corruption, nepotism and looting of national resources, causing impoverishment of Zimbabweans, in addition to ruining the economy which at independence in 1980 was considered an African jewel. Nehanda Radio