‘I was saved by Zanu-PF people during 2017 coup’ – Jonathan Moyo

Former cabinet Minister Jonathan Moyo said, to be alive today, he was saved by “genuine assistance and support” from Zanu PF people during the “life threatening” 2017 military coup that ousted the late former President Robert Mugabe.

During the peak of factionalism in Zanu-PF in 2017, Moyo and many other senior party officials who were aligned to Mugabe’s wife Grace were identified as “G-40”. They were opposed to then Vice President Emmerson Mnangagwa’s camp which was identified as the “lacoste” and its succession plan.

When the army took over power in November 2017, Moyo and his colleagues including former cabinet Ministers Patrick Zhuwao, Walter Mzembi and Saviour Kasukuwere fled the country.

Moyo said the whole ordeal was a “life threatening” situation that he and his family only survived through the assistance of some Zanu-PF people.

He did not mention names but emphasised that his bond with Zanu-PF is unbreakable despite the events of 2017.

Moyo revealed this in his long response to opposition Citizens Coalition for Change (CCC) senior member David Coltart who he accused of making “fraudulent and disgusting” comments about the death of his father Melusi Job Mlevu who “was callously murdered in Tsholotsho by gukurahundi soldiers on 22 January 1983.”

Coltart, a former Minister of Education, has since successfully apologised to Moyo.

In defending his ‘undying’ support for Zanu-PF, Moyo, a former Minister of Information, argued that his political career started with the ruling party supporting him with educational opportunities while he was in the United States.

When the military coup happened, Moyo said he was saved by Zanu-PF people who risked their lives to make sure his family was safe.

“Yet the bigger story is that I, my family and my colleagues survived that 2017 ordeal with the very direct, active and truly genuine assistance and support from Zanu PF people,” Moyo said.

“Working with other African Angeles, and I emphasize African Angeles, it was Zanu PF people who made sure that we were able to be safe and to get out of the country to be where I am today, all of them at great risk to their lives or livelihoods.

“In 2017 I was saved to be alive today by Zanu PF people.

“During the life threatening 2017 ordeal that my family and I went through, there was not even one person associated with the opposition as it was then, or as it is today, who reached out to find out where I was or how I was doing.

“It is common cause, some of it is documented, that many in the opposition then and who are still in opposition today, actually wanted me dead, all because of my political differences with them.”

Moyo and Zhuwao have since apologised to Zanu-PF for supporting the opposition during 2018 harmonised elections. They are not yet clear if they intend to come back to the party.

It is believed that Moyo is in Kenya while the rest of his colleagues are in South Africa.

Kasukuwere has already become a fierce critic of Mnangagwa following his public announcement that he wants to challenge the Zanu-PF leader in the upcoming elections to be held on the 23rd of August this year.

The former Zanu-PF political commissar’s candidature, however, was thrown out by the High Court over allegations that he was not in Zimbabwe for over 18 months.