HARARE – President Robert Mugabe has again attacked the United Kingdom and the United States of America for what he said is a relentless campaign to seize control of Zimbabwe’s rich mineral resources.In his opening address at the ongoing Zanu-PF congress in Harare Friday, President Mugabe decried what he said was infiltration of the country by the two rich countries.

“If the rich countries of the West see that you are a naturally resourced country and they envy those resources, they find a way of penetrating into your systems and indeed of wanting to control those resources,” Mugabe said.

He warned party supporters to be wary of Great Britain which he said continued to use Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai’s Movement for Democratic Change MDC, Zanu-PF’s partner in the inclusive government, as a front to advance an anti-Zimbabwe agenda.

“Defence of the natural resources means political defence through our being together,” he said, “being united in making a stand that Zimbabwe is for Zimbabweans and those who come here who are not Zimbabweans must support us.

“We have the right to national sovereignty and the right of control over our resources. When we open avenues for their participation, we are not saying they can become the owners of our country.

“We are only saying become partners with us and nothing more, nothing more, nothing more.”

There was loud applause from the delegates as Mugabe said this.

He said the MDC was formed in Great Britain through the Westminster Foundation and was now parroting a western agenda.

The Westminster Foundation for Democracy (WFD) was established in London in 1992 “to support the consolidation of democratic practices and institutions in developing democracies”. The foundation says on its website that it specializes in parliamentary strengthening and political party development; working at national, regional and local levels.

The foundation is sponsored by the Foreign and Commonwealth Office (FCO) and is accountable to the British Parliament for its expenditure.

Mugabe said MDC was talking a language “contrary to the language of the revolution” through support of the continued existence of sanctions against Zimbabwe and advocating for the reversal of the land reform programme.

Although Zanu-PF had embraced the MDC as a partner in the inclusive government, Mugabe said, the two parties’ appreciation of national issues was wide apart.

“We say svinurai, MDC, chinjai pfungwa. Nyika ndeyenyu, haisi yevarungu kwete. Haisi yanaBennett, (We say to the MDC, ‘Wake up, change your way of thinking. The country belongs to you, not to the white people. It does not belong to Roy Bennett and others.’),” Mugabe said.

“These people are settlers. Even if Bennett and the others were born here, they remain the off-spring of settlers.”

Mugabe said only divine intervention would make the MDC realize the folly of blindly following the white man’s thinking.

“We need that day when we can pray for the readjustment of our mental setup,” he said.

Mugabe also lashed at some Zanu-PF members and accused them of “playing into the hands of the enemy by squabbling for positions using channels which are not availed by our party’s constitution”.

Zanu-PF on Thursday thwarted an attempt by some party delegates to reopen nominations for the positions of Zanu-PF vice president and national chairman.

Mugabe read the riot act to some provincial chairpersons who threatened to resign from their positions in protest over what they alleged was the party’s continued imposition of candidates into the presidium.

The congress will confirm Mugabe as leader of Zanu-PF for another five-year term, with Joice Mujuru and vice president designate John Nkomo as his deputies. Zimbabwe’s ambassador to South Africa Simon Khaya Moyo will return from Pretoria to become the new national chairman of the party. Moyo was a protégé of the late PF-Zapu founder, Dr Joshua Nkomo.

Sources within the party say reform-minded members in the leadership of Zanu-PF now view Mugabe’s reelection as leader as retrogressive. They are said to blame the plunge in the party’s fortunes in elections last year to his faltering leadership.

Mugabe will turn 86 years old in February.

thezimbabwetimes