The odds are stacked against the opposition, the Citizens Coalition for Change.<\/p>\n
The opposition party has accused the president of a crackdown on political opponents.<\/p>\n
Nelson Chamisa, a 45-year-old lawyer and pastor, will be Zimbabwean President Emmerson Mnangagwa’s official opponent for a second time in an upcoming crunch vote, the opposition party confirmed on Thursday.<\/p>\n
No date has yet been set for the presidential and legislative votes, though they are expected to be held in August.<\/p>\n
An independent committee announced Chamisa was re-elected as the opposition party’s presidential candidate in an uncontested vote.<\/p>\n
“Chamisa has been nominated as the presidential candidate by all streets and villages”, the committee’s spokesman Shepherd Ngandu told a press conference in Harare.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
Crackdown on opponents<\/p>\n
The odds are stacked against the opposition, the Citizens Coalition for Change (CCC), which has accused the president of a crackdown on political opponents.<\/p>\n
Some of the CCC’s campaigns have been blocked by the ruling party and the police.<\/p>\n
There have also been widespread arrests of key opposition party officials.<\/p>\n
Chamisa last week took to Twitter to accuse the government of “weaponisation of the law” and “unjustly” incarcerating firebrand CCC lawmaker Job Sikhala, who has been held in a maximum-security prison in since June.<\/p>\n
Convicted<\/h4>\n
He was arrested alongside the party’s spokeswoman Fadzayi Mahere, who was convicted of publishing falsehoods last week.<\/p>\n
Chamisa said on Twitter Mahere’s conviction was “evidence of the increasing attacks on democratic forces in Zimbabwe”, which he said needed “fixing”.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
Mnangagwa, known as “the Crocodile,” for his ruthless cunning, replaced strongman ruler Robert Mugabe in 2017 after a military-led coup.<\/p>\n
He faces widespread discontent as he struggles to ease entrenched poverty, end chronic power cuts and economic hardship.<\/p>\n
In their initial face-off in 2018, Mnangagwa narrowly won the landmark election with 50.8 percent of the vote.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The odds are stacked against the opposition, the Citizens Coalition for Change. The opposition party has accused the president of a crackdown on political opponents. Nelson Chamisa, a 45-year-old lawyer and pastor, will be Zimbabwean President Emmerson Mnangagwa’s official opponent for a second time in an upcoming crunch vote, the opposition party confirmed on Thursday. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":14,"featured_media":17328,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jnews-multi-image_gallery":[],"jnews_single_post":{"source_name":"","source_url":"","via_name":"","via_url":"","override_template":"0","override":[{"template":"1","single_blog_custom":"","parallax":"1","fullscreen":"1","layout":"right-sidebar","sidebar":"default-sidebar","second_sidebar":"default-sidebar","sticky_sidebar":"1","share_position":"top","share_float_style":"share-monocrhome","show_share_counter":"1","show_view_counter":"1","show_featured":"1","show_post_meta":"1","show_post_author":"1","show_post_author_image":"1","show_post_date":"1","post_date_format":"default","post_date_format_custom":"Y\/m\/d","show_post_category":"1","show_post_reading_time":"0","post_reading_time_wpm":"300","show_zoom_button":"0","zoom_button_out_step":"2","zoom_button_in_step":"3","show_post_tag":"1","show_prev_next_post":"1","show_popup_post":"1","number_popup_post":"1","show_author_box":"0","show_post_related":"0","show_inline_post_related":"0"}],"override_image_size":"0","image_override":[{"single_post_thumbnail_size":"crop-500","single_post_gallery_size":"crop-500"}],"trending_post":"0","trending_post_position":"meta","trending_post_label":"Trending","sponsored_post":"0","sponsored_post_label":"Sponsored by","sponsored_post_name":"","sponsored_post_url":"","sponsored_post_logo_enable":"0","sponsored_post_logo":"","sponsored_post_desc":"","disable_ad":"0"},"jnews_primary_category":{"id":""},"jnews_social_meta":{"fb_title":"","fb_description":"","fb_image":"","twitter_title":"","twitter_description":"","twitter_image":""},"jnews_review":[],"enable_review":"0","type":"percentage","name":"","summary":"","brand":"","sku":"","good":[{"good_text":""}],"bad":[{"bad_text":""}],"score_override":"","override_value":"","rating":[{"rating_text":"","rating_number":"10"}],"price":[{"shop":"","price":"","link":"","icon":""}],"jnews_override_counter":{"override_view_counter":"0","view_counter_number":"0","override_share_counter":"0","share_counter_number":"0","override_like_counter":"0","like_counter_number":"0","override_dislike_counter":"0","dislike_counter_number":"0"},"jnews_post_split":{"enable_post_split":"0","post_split":[{"template":"1","tag":"h2","numbering":"asc","mode":"normal","first":"0","enable_toc":"0","toc_type":"normal"}]},"footnotes":""},"categories":[5311],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-17327","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-international"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/kivuavenir.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17327","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/kivuavenir.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/kivuavenir.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kivuavenir.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/14"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kivuavenir.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=17327"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/kivuavenir.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17327\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":17329,"href":"https:\/\/kivuavenir.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17327\/revisions\/17329"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kivuavenir.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/17328"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/kivuavenir.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=17327"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kivuavenir.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=17327"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kivuavenir.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=17327"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}