Tinaye Agere
Samuel Kadungure in MUTARE
ZANU PF Manicaland province on Saturday commenced a restructuring exercise to account for the party’s entire membership in the region and gauge its strength at grassroots level.
Addressing the party’s Provincial Coordinating Committee (PCC) meeting held at Marymount Teachers’ College in Mutare on Saturday, ZANU PF Secretary for Legal Affairs Cde Patrick Chinamasa said restructuring of party cells will be held between June 17 and July 17.
He said new cell registers will be created to capture members’ essential details such as their full name, national identity number, date of birth, membership number, physical address and phone numbers.
The province, he said, will host inter-district meetings next weekend to cascade the restructuring exercise to lower levels of the party.
“The inter-district meetings should be followed by inter-branch meetings to be held on June 15 and 16, 2024, while the actual restructuring effectively begins on June 17 and ends on July 17, 2024.
“The inter-branch meetings are very important since the branch executive committees will physically carry out the actual restructuring of the cells and villages under their jurisdiction, with supervision from district coordinating committees (DCC) and the provincial leadership,” he said.
Cde Chinamasa said a self-verification exercise to authenticate members of cells and village structures will be held during the first weekend of July.
He said the second phase of the restructuring exercise will involve the deployment of officials from the party headquarters and provinces to conduct a final verification of the membership of the new cells and villages.
Cde Chinamasa also proposed that registration of members starts from those aged 13, saying they will be eligible to vote in 2028.
“We should start to politicise our children at school because they will be the virgin voters in 2028,” he said.
“It is at that age that we were politicised, and we should find a deliberate way to get into schools, not to politic, but educate them on where we are coming from and going as a country.”
Cde Chinamasa urged party members to respect traditional leaders and work in harmony with those who may be hostile to the ruling party.
“Do whatever it takes to win their support; find ways to win and work with them well,” he continued.
“Traditional leaders are being targeted by the enemy, and we should not sit on our laurels while the opposition poaches them.”
Other provinces are expected to hold their PCC meetings today in preparation for the restructuring exercise.
Online Reporter