Chiwenga and the Generals VS Mnangagwa and the Mbingas: ZANU PF fight sharpens after Chivayo’s mysterious death

The sudden cancellation of a ZANU PF Politburo meeting, followed by Vice-President Constantino Chiwenga’s absence from two high-profile events, has brought the party’s leadership tensions into sharper view. The developments came as the ruling party prepared for its annual conference and as President Emmerson Mnangagwa’s government gave prominent businessman Kudakwashe Tagwirei a senior economic portfolio.

The public events do not, on their own, explain the private calculations inside the party. But they have placed three connected questions at the centre of the week’s political story: who will shape ZANU PF’s internal rules, who will have influence over the choice of the next president, and how much weight will be given to the business figures now entering formal government and party structures?

A Politburo meeting scheduled for the afternoon of Friday, October 9, was called off after members had started gathering at the party’s headquarters in Harare. The meeting had been expected to consider changes to the ZANU PF constitution before the party’s 23rd National People’s Conference, due to run in Chinhoyi from October 12 to 17.

Party spokesperson Christopher Mutsvangwa confirmed the postponement and said: “There was a clash or an overflow of programmes, and the meeting was postponed.” Party information director Farai Marapira also referred to a “clash of programmes” and said the cancellation was “nothing serious”.

Accounts of the meeting’s cancellation differed. One version, attributed to political activist Jealousy Mawarire, said Chiwenga challenged proposed changes to the party constitution before Mnangagwa arrived. Mawarire alleged that the Vice-President demanded to see draft amendments being handled by ZANU PF secretary-general Jacob Mudenda and questioned whether changes to the national Constitution had been approved through party resolutions. He further claimed that Chiwenga instructed Mudenda to tell Mnangagwa that the proposed amendments would not be discussed.

Former Norton MP Temba Mliswa rejected that account, describing it as “absolute lies” and saying the cancellation had “nothing to do with VP Chiwenga”. Mnangagwa and Chiwenga had not publicly commented on the competing accounts by the time of the reports. The party’s stated explanation remained a clash of programmes.

The cancelled meeting was followed by another conspicuous absence. On Saturday, October 10, Chiwenga did not attend the inaugural President’s Ball at the Hippodrome in Braeside, Harare. Mnangagwa and First Lady Auxillia Mnangagwa were there, alongside Vice-President Kembo Mohadi, ZANU PF secretary-general Jacob Mudenda and party chairperson Oppah Muchinguri-Kashiri. Chiwenga was reported to be the only member of the party’s presidium missing from the gathering.

The event, organised by fundraising committee chairperson Philip Chiyangwa, aimed to raise US$6 million towards preparations for the Chinhoyi conference. No official explanation was given for Chiwenga’s absence. Its timing, one day after the Politburo meeting was cancelled, added to the attention on his relationship with Mnangagwa and the party leadership. However, the party reported that it exceeded its target and a staggering US$9.5 million was raised during the event.

Chiwenga had also been absent from the mourning and funeral proceedings for Wicknell Chivayo, the businessman and ZANU PF benefactor who died with his wife, Lucy Muteke, in a helicopter crash on September 30. The aircraft came down near Marondera as the couple travelled from Chivayo’s rural home in Chivhu, with a planned stop at Muteke’s family home. A female security officer and two pilots also died in the crash and their bodies were severely dismembered and some of the bodies where buried without their heads, according to information given by Herbert Chivayo, the family spokesperson.

Chivayo and Muteke were buried together at Glen Forest Memorial Park in Harare on October 8. Mnangagwa had visited Chivayo’s home to pay his respects and described him as a “friend”. Chivayo was granted provincial-hero status in Mashonaland East, the province where the crash occurred. The burial included military honours, including a two-gun salute and a bugler playing Taps.

Chiwenga’s absence from the funeral was noted alongside that of the President’s deputy at the fundraising dinner. Reports of the mourning proceedings recorded Kembo Mohadi issuing a formal condolence statement and Muchinguri attending. They did not identify an equivalent public condolence statement from Chiwenga. However, the military was not wholly absent from Chivayo’s burial: army personnel took part in the honours.

Meanwhile, a separate family celebration involving Chiwenga and his wife, Colonel Miniyothabo Baloyi-Chiwenga, has also featured in discussion around his absence. The event marked her 50th birthday and doctoral graduation. Its date was September 26, four days before the helicopter crash. It therefore took place before Chivayo’s death and before arrangements for his burial began, rather than during the funeral preparations.

The crash itself has added a sombre dimension to the week. Chivayo and Muteke’s remains were identified through DNA testing, and plans for body viewing were abandoned after the families said the victims’ heads had not been recovered. The wreckage was moved for forensic examination, and a preliminary report was expected within 30 days. The cause of the crash had not been established in the reports available by the time of the funeral.

Chivayo’s death drew attention to the close links between business, political patronage and state contracts in Zimbabwe. His public profile had grown through donations of money and luxury vehicles to musicians, churches, politicians and football clubs. He had also secured major public contracts, including a deal worth more than US$115 million to supply election materials ahead of the 2023 elections. The contract was awarded without an open competitive tender, a process that attracted questions about how the contract had been granted.

The political significance of money and appointments became more immediate on October 8, the day Chivayo and Muteke were buried. Mnangagwa appointed Tagwirei as Minister of Economic Development and Investment Promotion. The announcement, made by Chief Secretary to the President and Cabinet Martin Rushwaya, took immediate effect. Finance Minister Mthuli Ncube was reassigned to the Finance portfolio, losing the economic development and investment promotion functions previously attached to his ministry.

Tagwirei had already moved into formal party and state roles. He was co-opted into ZANU PF’s Central Committee in 2025 and appointed to one of 10 additional Senate seats created under Constitution Amendment No. 3. He was sworn into the Senate on September 1. His new Cabinet position places him at the centre of the government’s investment-promotion work, as the party enters a period in which the rules governing leadership and presidential succession are under scrutiny.

That constitutional backdrop is central to the dispute over the party’s internal rules. The Constitution of Zimbabwe Amendment (No. 3) Act, 2026, was published on July 7. It changed the presidential and parliamentary terms from five years to seven and provides for the President to be elected by members of Parliament at a joint sitting, rather than directly by voters. It also increased the Senate from 80 to 90 members, including 10 members appointed by the President, and says the extended term applies to the continuation in office of the current President and Parliament. Under the revised timetable, the next general election is expected in 2030.

The proposed ZANU PF changes were reportedly intended to bring the party constitution into line with the national changes. The party’s draft amendments and the precise provisions under discussion were not made public in the accounts of the cancelled meeting. But the meeting’s collapse has put the internal process itself under pressure: party members are divided over who should shape the rules and how the party should prepare for the next leadership transition.

The origins of the present relationship between Mnangagwa and Chiwenga stretch back to November 2017, when the military intervened during the final days of Robert Mugabe’s presidency. Chiwenga was then commander of the Zimbabwe Defence Forces. Mugabe left office, Mnangagwa returned from exile and took over the presidency, and Chiwenga later moved from military command into the Vice-Presidency. Senior military figures also took prominent roles in the administration that followed.

That transition gave the military establishment a direct place in the country’s political leadership. In the years since, business figures with close government ties have gained greater access to party structures and public office. Tagwirei’s Senate and Cabinet appointments, the fundraising drive for the party conference, and the competing proposals over ZANU PF’s constitution have brought those different sources of influence into the same political moment.

The week’s events have therefore extended beyond a cancelled meeting or an empty seat at a dinner. Chiwenga missed the mourning for a prominent Mnangagwa ally and then the President’s Ball, while the party heads towards a conference where constitutional amendments are expected to be discussed. At the same time, Mnangagwa’s government has elevated a businessman who has built both commercial influence and a formal role in the ruling party.

ZANU PF’s conference in Chinhoyi is now the next major test of whether the party can agree on its internal rules. The questions surrounding the postponed Politburo session, the party’s next leadership phase and the growing place of business figures in government remain in view as delegates prepare to gather.