Zimbabwe’s major opposition leader has resigned from his party, Citizens Coalition For Change, after accusing the government party of hijacking it and removing scores of his parliamentarians and councilors.
Nelson Chamisa, 45, was President Emmerson Mnangagwa’s primary challenger in the 2018 and 2023 disputed elections.
On Thursday, he accused Mnangagwa of decimating the opposition through authoritarian measures.
Chamisa criticised the dictatorial past of the economically and politically challenged southern African country in a 13-page statement posted on his social media outlets and the party’s X, formerly Twitter, page.
Chamisa stated that he will remain active in public service and urged people to “rally behind fresh politics” as he prepares to declare his future steps.
Chamisa founded the Citizens Coalition for Change party in 2022, breaking away from the country’s long-standing opposition party, the Movement for Democratic Change, or MDC, after the High Court in Harare decided that he was not the rightful leader.
He contested last year’s elections that he later described as a “gigantic fraud, garnering 44 percent of the vote to Mnangagwa’s 52.6 percent.
But the 45-year-old has struggled to hold his party together since the elections after a man claiming to be the party’s secretary-general began removing elected officials with support from parliamentary authorities, the government and the courts.
