Midlands endorses ED

Midlands Bureau
Zanu-PF Midlands province has reaffirmed support for President Mnangagwa’s candidature in next year’s harmonised elections.

Provincial chairperson, Engineer Daniel Mackenzie Ncube, said in an interview yesterday that they were united behind the sole candidature of President Mnangagwa in the 2018 harmonised elections, adding that going to the Extraordinary Congress was just a formality.

“As a province, we have endorsed the candidature of Cde Mnangagwa as the Zanu-PF candidate in the 2018 harmonised elections,” he said.

“Cde Mnangagwa is the sole candidate for the party in the 2018 harmonised elections and there is not two ways about that.”

Eng Ncube said even the provincial inter-district meeting they were going to have on Thursday in Kwekwe was just for the purposes of buttressing the point that President Mnangagwa was their candidate.

He said the province was sending 772 delegates from its 563 party districts to represent the province at the Extraordinary Congress set for Harare this week.

Eng Ncube said the province on Saturday accredited 552 delegates that will travel to Harare for the Extraordinary Congress, and on Sunday they accredited about 200 people from Gokwe North and Gokwe South who could not travel to Gweru.

He said the province would have its inter-district conference on Thursday after which they would leave for Harare on the same day.

“The accreditation went on very smoothly,” said Eng Ncube.

“We followed the list that was submitted before and those are the people whom we have accredited.

“The number of delegates has been reduced substantially and we are guided by that.

“The number of delegates from party districts is 563, then in addition there would be members of the Central Committee, National Consultative Assembly (NCA). The total number will come to 772.”

Eng Ncube said the province remained confident to mobilising more than 800 000 people to vote ahead of the 2018 harmonised elections.

He said to date the party has successfully helped in mobilising 529 300 people to register to vote during the ongoing Biometric Voter Registration (BVR) blitz.

Eng Ncube said Kwekwe had recorded the highest number of people who registered to vote with 115 000 followed by Gweru with 51 000 people.

He said the party had more than 631 000 members at cell level in the province and was looking forward to cultivating more supporters ahead of the 2018 elections.

“As a party we are doing better in terms of mobilising people to vote,” he said.

“I have been informed that more than 529 300 people have so far registered to vote in the province.

“Our target, however, is 800 000 and at this rate, it is achievable.”