CIO boss death leaves Mugabe in quandary

Muzariri a close ally of Emmerson Mnangagwa and a fierce rival of the current intelligence chief Happiton Bonyongwe died on Monday and is expected to be declared a national hero.

Bonyongwe a career soldier was controversially reappointed by Mugabe in 2009 when Muzariri was certain his turn to be the head had arrived. Muzariri had written to Mugabe detailing the close ties between Bonyongwe and Simba Makoni of the Mavambo party, according to intelligence sources.

Bonyongwe is also a close ally of Solomon Mujuru a fierce rival of Mnangagwa. Analysists said Mugabe has been left in the quandary as he has been relying on setting the two rival camps in intelligence against each other.

President Robert Mugabe will have to appoint a person who will ensure that there is balance in the CIO, otherwise the Mnangagwa faction will feel that it has been left behind. At the moment it is the Mujuru faction that has overall control and that does not augur well for Mugabe, said an analysist.

Unlike Bonyongwe the late Muzariri was a career intelligence man who was in 1980 deployed to the Prime Ministers Office as an intelligence officer from the intelligence unit of zanu’s guerilla army, zanla.

According to the Presidents Office He attended prestigious intelligence institutions in Africa and abroad, obtaining

internationally recognised intelligence qualifications that saw him being promoted to the post of Head of Division in 1984.

The loyal Muzariri was in 1997 appointed to the post of Director Internal.

His Excellency, the President of the Republic of Zimbabwe and Commander In Chief of the Zimbabwe Defence Forces, Robert Mugabe, in 2003 appointed him to the rank of Deputy Director General in the Presidents Department, a rank he held at the time of his untimely passing-on, said the office.