20/11/2025
Tagwirei positioning him self to succeed ED
While we are busy focused on the 2030 presidential term extension theatrics, the presidential race to take over from President Emmerson Mnangagwa is already in full swing inside ZANUPF.
By Hopewell Chin'ono
It is an open secret that Mnangagwa’s preferred successor is businessman Kudakwashe Tagwirei, and the dark horse is General Valerio Sibanda, who retired from the army in an announcement made yesterday by the presidency.
Tagwirei is already on a campaign trail which some have not observed, and all the issues he is raising are carefully crafted to resonate with ordinary citizens, shifting from liberation struggle slogans like Pasi neMhandu to Pasi neNhamo and Mari Muhomwe.
He is deliberately rebranding himself as a champion of economic grievances, positioning his message to speak directly to poverty, hardship, and the cost of living, rather than the old liberation rhetoric. This is not accidental, his nemesis is a soldier and military general whose track record is rooted in Zimbabwe's excesses.
What Tagwirei is doing is planting in his rallies a political seed that he hopes will germinate between now and 2027, when the ZANUPF Congress is expected to elect a new leader, or even earlier if an extraordinary congress is convened as some in the ruling party suspect might happen.
That seed is intended to carry him into 2028, when the general election is due, if he succeeds in taking over should his principal, President Mnangagwa, not change his mind or Chiwenga stages a dramatic miracle coup.
He is laying the groundwork early, shaping public perception, opinion and positioning himself as the natural successor by tapping into economic frustrations that ordinary citizens understand and feel every day. The elites see things differently, but it is the poor in townships and rural Zimbabwe who are being targeted with this messaging.
When I look at the political landscape in Zimbabwe today, I see nobody else, either in the opposition or in ZANUPF, offering a clear and solid message that speaks to the people’s real needs.
What we consider logical in elite circles does not sell to the poor, their needs are immediate. They want solutions for today, regardless of who created the problems that require solutions.
While the educated elites talk about root-cause analysis and solutions for a distant future in their scenarios, the ordinary citizens want Sapatina, a euphemism for something that comes today, coined by a man who was perfectly happy eating chicken and chips/fries at State House. Our struggles are different.
Vice President General Constantino Chiwenga, who thought he was a shoo in to become the next president after leading a coup against Robert Mugabe and making way for Mnangagwa, is now talking about corruption, something we have discussed for years to appeal to the masses.
But Tagwirei is positioning himself differently. He is in full campaign mode, planting messages aimed at securing his place in the succession race, messages of economic prosperity.
He is speaking to the daily needs of ZANUPF supporters and Zimbabweans in general. He is placing himself before the electorate, travelling, being visible, leveraging state linked platforms, and promising youths economic empowerment.
Meanwhile, the general is speaking in closed boardrooms, and nobody has heard him speak directly to his presidential ambitions outside his own circle. Tagwirei is out in the open shaping a constituency, while Chiwenga remains confined to private spaces that do not build political momentum.
That does not look regular to me unless he has an ace up his sleeves, a coup, because a coup does not require much talking.
But as Mnangagwa shuts all the options once available to him by creating a state security sector in his own image, the prospects of a coup become slimmer with each move made by Mnangagwa.
In closing those doors and pathways, Mnangagwa has effectively weakened Chiwenga’s leverage and narrowed the space in which he could plausibly attempt anything outside the formal succession path using ZANUPF internal processes.
Tagwirei’s "meet the people" type of rallies with music stars in tow point to a group of people focused on winning hearts and minds both inside and outside ZANUPF. They have money. The other side has passion and entitlement, but without money there is very little political traction in Zimbabwe’s political theatre, where loyalties change based on what is on the table.
Politics the world over is about money, that is why Elon Musk claimed that he won the election for Donald Trump, and that is why Trump said you need US$5 billion to become a president in America, it is about money. When you strip away the slogans and the drama, the real engine of political power is financial muscle, whether in Zimbabwe, America, or anywhere else.
Tagwirei’s Godfather Mnangagwa understands that politics in Zimbabwe is transactional, and he is investing heavily in shaping perceptions, building networks, and buying influence long before the succession battle formally begins.
Those opposed to Mnangagwa and his faction must not wake up tomorrow pretending they did not see this coming. It is obvious that Tagwirei is positioning himself as the most visible, accessible and well financed candidate within ZANUPF.
It is also obvious that there is no opposition in Zimbabwe and that Chiwenga’s grip has been terribly loosened in unthinkable ways. Anyone paying attention can see the succession terrain shifting, and those who fail to read these signals will only have themselves to blame when the outcome unfolds.
The question for the remnants of the main opposition is simple. What are you doing about 2028? Because while everyone is distracted by the talk of 2030, that talk may turn out to be a political ruse, a deliberate decoy to make us ignore what is unfolding on the ground.
2030 could be the bait that sends General Chiwenga chasing shadows while his real competitor campaigns at grassroots level, spends money, and entrenches himself as a household name.
Mnangagwa is a political strategist who has won politically through hook or crook, so it would be a fatal mistake to assume that he has only one plan. A second option is to push for 2030, not with the intention of serving until then, but to block General Chiwenga at a congress and secure enough time to hand over to a successor of his choice after defeating Chiwenga.
That is on condition that Chiwenga even has the guts to challenge him for the party leadership, which at the moment looks increasingly doubtful.
If General Chiwenga puts his faith in the ZANUPF electoral processes through Congress or an Extraordinary Congress which elects a leader, then he is finished.
He will be beaten on the floor even by Kuda Tagwirei, not because of anything else, but because Tagwirei and the Mnangagwa team have the resources that the general might not want to spend, even though he is a wealthy man, or might not actually have available as disposable funds for an internal election campaign he is likely to lose.
Mnangagwa also has the power of incumbency, something that has been stripped away from Chiwenga as his lieutenants were retired or died one by one. That erosion of his inner circle has left him exposed, weakened, and without the institutional backing he once relied on.
Mnangagwa, meanwhile, has consolidated the state, the party, and the security apparatus in his favour, widening the gulf between the two men.
What we are seeing now is the opening of the presidential race, with Mnangagwa’s side fully satisfied that they have degraded Chiwenga’s powers to a point where they can now campaign openly. Where is the general?
The consolidation of power in the army through the appointment of General Walter Tapfumaneyi, who worked closely with Tagwirei during the 2023 elections, is a clear signal of the new power architecture.
More military purges are coming, including the removal of Chiwenga’s wife from military intelligence, and each one further isolates Chiwenga while tightening Mnangagwa’s control over the security establishment.
This systematic dismantling of his support base makes it clear that the succession battle has already begun, and that Chiwenga is being pushed further away from the centres of real power with every move.
The Chinese general Sun Tzu teaches that “all warfare is based on deception”, and Mnangagwa has perfected this by using 2030 as a decoy while quietly weakening Chiwenga and allowing Tagwirei to advance. He has also mastered the art of appearing weak when he is strong, and appearing strong when he is weak, creating confusion while he restructures the state and securing loyalty across the security ranks.
Those in the media and diplomatic circles know that Mnangagwa deliberately appeared weak on many occasions, and his emissaries would tell diplomats and journalists that he had no power to act on many serious issues because Chiwenga was supposedly too powerful. It was an illusion they deliberately created.
They created a fictitious image of an all-powerful General Chiwenga, a narrative that fits perfectly into Sun Tzu’s teaching about appearing weak when you are strong and appearing strong when you are weak.
There were also moments when Mnangagwa appeared very strong, such as in 2019 when Chiwenga's side thought of carrying out a coup. Mnangagwa projected firmness, yet behind the scenes he was weak, hesitant, and deeply indecisive in dealing with the unfolding crisis.
If you remember the period when the internet was shut down, that moment exposed just how fragile the inner workings of power were, despite the public portrayal of a decisive leader.
Mnangagwa’s team, led by Tagwirei, now embodies the wisdom that “victorious warriors win first and then go to war”, planting narratives, building visibility, and mobilising resources long before the battle officially begins.
In this environment, the utter disarray in the opposition makes it effortless for ZANUPF to open war fronts within itself, because when the enemy outside has collapsed, the real contest becomes the fight to inherit the throne.
