Former Manicaland Provincial Affairs Minister and firebrand politician Mandiitawepi Chimene is set to return home.
The former Zanu Pf heavyweight politician has been residing in neighbouring Mozambique since November 2017, having fled the country during the Military coup that toppled long-time ruler, the late Robert Gabriel Mugabe.
Chimene, in an interview held with the State owned Herald newspaper at her base in Mozambique, was quoted as saying that she had received assurances on her safety from President Emmerson Mnangagwa.
Chimene, a former staunch Mugabe loyalist who was one of the top G-40 kingpins during the fierce ruling party factional fights that pitted her faction against the pro Mnangagwa Lacoste faction, escaped into neighbouring Mozambique in the wake of the November 17, 2017 coup as several of her faction’s top guns opted to live in exile fearing for their lives.
On November 21, 2017, The Southern African nation’s military carried out what it termed “Operation Restore Legacy”, where it claimed to be targeting “criminals around the President,” accusing members of the G40 faction of capturing Mugabe.
Most analysts however, described the army’s action as a military coup.
The outspoken Chimene said she met President Mnangagwa in Mozambique’s Manica province, after the country’s leader, President Phillipe Nyusi arranged the meeting.
“He said come back home and l said l am coming,” said Chimene in her interview with State media.
The former Manicaland political heavyweight denied claims that she was afraid of returning home, insisting that her prolonged stay in the neighbouring country was due to several agricultural projects that she had initiated, adding that her mother was from Mozambique.
“I am here not because l’m a refugee no,” she said. “I’m actually a niece here, l am in my uncles’ home.”
She also denied claims that she was part of the vanquished G-40 faction. The term was coined by exiled former Higher Education Minister, Professor Jonathan Moyo. The faction’s members were mostly the ruling party’s young turks who were fighting for what they termed “generation renewal”.
“l was never on any of the sides, both factions were uncertain about my affiliations,” she added.
Despite her denials however, Chimene was a well known Robert Mugabe loyalist and publicly stood against the then Vice President Emmerson Mnangawa’s push to succeed his then longtime mentor Mugabe.
