Mutambara has no regrets on joining politics

Mutambara has no regrets on joining politics

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By Staff Reporter

ZIMBABWEAN opposition leader Arthur Mutambara says he does not regret quitting robotics science to enter politics.

Speaking from Washington DC after meeting Zimbabweans, Mutambara said recent electoral setbacks for his faction of the opposition Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) had not made him reconsider his position.

A small gathering of journalists and Zimbabweans turned up to listen to the former NASA rocket scientist in the the suburb of Gaithersburg in Washington DC.

Mutambara said: “Many people are asking me why I left the comfort of the US where I have a green card or South Africa where I have a resident’s permit to join the political bandwagon.

"I am happy to have made such a decision to be in the trenches, fighting Robert Mugabe."

Mutambara told the meeting that Zimbabweans in the Diaspora had an active role to play in the “struggle” at home.

On the trip, Mutambara, who met a number of US government officials, was accompanied by MDC secretary-general Welshman Ncube, Bulawayo South MP, David Coltart and Isaac Maphosa, a top party figure based in South Africa.

Coltart told the same gathering that it was now irrelevant to describe the two warring factions of the MDC -- one led by Morgan Tsvangirai and the other by Mutambara -- as as pro or anti-Senate.

Coltart said there were people in the so-called anti-senate, like Isaac Matongo, who actually supported the Senate elections while there were others like Mutambara himself who were anti-Senate but were now the so-called pro-Senate group.

Zimbabwean political commentators say Zimbabwe's opposition is now weakened following the split last November.
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