THE United States has lifted a travel ban on ZAPU leader Dumiso Dabengwa, his party said.
Thenjiwe Lesabe, who like Dabengwa quit President Robert Mugabe’s Zanu PF party to revive ZAPU, was also removed from the sanctions list.
But the travel relief came a few years late for Lesabe whose daughter was taken ill in the United States and she was unable to see her before her death last year.
Meanwhile, Dabengwa’s daughter, Ijeoma, 39, had her accounts frozen.
ZAPU spokesman Methuseli Moyo said “the development confirms that the American government, and indeed the entire international community, recognises ZAPU’s fight for democracy in Zimbabwe.”
He added: “The delisting of the duo is a big seal of approval on our party and its leadership. It is recognition that our party is part of the solution to our country’s political problems.”
Earlier this year, the European Union lifted travel restrictions on Dabengwa and the United States action was not unexpected.
Dabengwa and Lesabe were caught up in sanctions imposed on Zimbabwe in 2001 and 2002 by the United States and the European Union respectively following disputed elections and alleged human rights violations by President Mugabe’s Zanu PF party.
Dabengwa, a liberation war hero, quit Zanu PF in 2008 and briefly supported Simba Makoni’s presidential campaign before declaring that he was reviving ZAPU which formed a coalition with Mugabe’s party in 1987 to end a bloody military operation targeting its supporters in Matabeleland and the Midlands.
Moyo said Dabengwa received the news while in Algiers, Algeria, where he attended an international conference to celebrate the 50th Anniversary of the United Nations’ Adoption of Resolution 1514 – The Declaration on the Granting of Independence to Colonial Countries and Peoples.
Dabengwa spoke at the event attended by Zambia’s founding President Kenneth Kaunda, and former South African President Thabo Mbeki.