Harare — AS the jostling for the right to represent ZANU PF in the senatorial elections intensifies, cracks are widening within the ruling party amid revelations that the politburo wants to give the old guard the exclusive right to represent the ruling party in the polls.

ZANU PF insiders told The Financial Gazette yesterday that while there was fierce jockeying as aspiring senators went around their respective constituencies canvassing support to win the right to represent the ruling party, indications were that politburo, central committee and consultative assembly members not already in parliament would be given priority in the selection of candidates to represent the party.

In what is perhaps the most decisive rupture with tradition, the ZANU PF politburo has ruled out the holding of primaries to select candidates to represent the ruling party but will instead choose candidates "by consensus."

However, the party insiders said the forthcoming senatorial elections had the potential to further drive a wedge within the faction-riddled party, with so-called Young Turks unhappy over the selection criteria.

The ruling party has laid rules and guidelines for the selection of candidates to represent it in the polls to be held before the end of November.

ZANU PF used its controversial majority in Parliament to amend the country's constitution for the 17th time since independence from Britain in 1980 to allow for the re-establishment of an Upper House for which the senatorial elections are to be held.

Only party cadres over the age of 40 years will be allowed to represent the party after a vigorous vetting exercise and those suspended for one crime or another are barred, a rule that leaves the six provincial chairmen suspended after the Tsholotsho debacle in the cold.

Party insiders said yesterday so sharp were differences within ZANU PF that in some areas like Makonde as many as 16 cadres were vying to represent the ruling party. There is a general consensus among ZANU PF Young Turks that President Mugabe, the party's first secretary, and his politburo intended packing the Senate with the old guard and other loyalists. This is also the view held by the opposition Movement for Democratic Change (MDC), which has also been divided on whether it should participate in the senatorial polls or not.

"The politburo has made a decision to allow its members and those of the central committee and consultative assembly to stand," said a ZANU PF official.

"The idea is to put the old guard in the politburo, the central committee and the consultative assembly in the senate. The senate is a pension for loyalists. They will just sit there in the Upper House drawing perks as a thank you gesture from the party," added the same source, speaking anonymously.

"They are not looking at a popular candidate but a candidate wanted by the politburo. The Young Turks have no chance because the Upper House has been created for seatless members of the politburo, central committee and the consultative assembly," added another senior ZANU PF official.

"We are going to see one of the poorest campaigns in the history of ZANU PF because some of these people they want in the senate are too old and are not financially independent. Campaigning is gruelling and most of these people are too old and cannot measure up to the candidates in the MDC if the opposition party decides to enter the race," said another female member of ZANU PF, who stated it was clear President Mugabe wanted the senate to accommodate old political friends at the end of their political careers.

However, according to Elliot Manyika, the ZANU PF national political commissar, in the absence of primary elections, candidates would be elected through consensus at district and provincial levels before their names are submitted to the national elections directorate.

The presidium, as in all elections in ZANU PF, would have the final say in the selection of party cadres to represent the party in the senatorial elections, whose actual date is yet to be announced.