THE National Defence College (NDC) is producing officers with capacity to counter multiple national security threats posed by agents of regime change, President Robert Mugabe has said.

Due to its vast mineral resources, Zimbabwe has been under siege especially from former colonial master Britain, which has for more than a decade been trying to effect regime change.
Speaking at the graduation of the first batch of students, President Mugabe described the NDC as a solution to the country’s threats.
“When our country faced a plethora of complex national security challenges, a situation deliberately stirred by agents of regime change with our people also facing many hardships, our independence was indeed threatened,” said President Mugabe.
“The establishment of the NDC was conceived as one way of effectively dealing with the externally induced threats to our national security.
“The construction of the NDC therefore became part of the answer to our problems.”
More than 20 students went through an 11-month course that covered domestic studies relating to the national education policy, defence policy and international law, regional and international organisations.
President Mugabe hailed the support extended by the Chinese in setting up the NDC.
“The Chinese government readily supported us in establishing an institution that would immensely contribute towards safeguarding our national sovereignty and territorial integrity,” he said.
The Chinese availed a US$98 million interest free loan facility to construct the NDC.
In an interview, Brigadier General Emile Munemo, who was one of the graduates said the college contributed towards national and international security through research and development.
“NDC is the last and highest level of academic education for the officers of the armed forces, as well as for the high ranking civilian personnel, and executives of the security forces in providing a high level academic knowledge in the broad field of strategic studies,” said Brig Gen Munemo.
Brig Gen Munemo said in the long run the college in its enrolment will include civil society and Southern African Development Community (SADC) Alliance students.
“There is need for a patriotic civil society that is able to uphold the country’s interests and values,” he said.
The works of non-governmental organisations (NGOs), who now constitute a destabilising colony in Zimbabwe by their sheer staggering number now said to be over 3 000 is opposed to the ideals of the liberation struggle.
Analysts say new technology and the continued discovery of strategic mineral resources are posing far-reaching political, economic and security challenges to the African continent.
Two years ago, Philip Hammond, UK Defence Secretary, urged British businessmen to begin “packing their suitcases” and to fly to Libya to share in the reconstruction of the country and exploit an anticipated boom in natural resources.
Two years ago, the West invaded Libya and dislodged Colonel Kaddafi from power. Libya holds approximately 3,5 percent of global oil reserves, more than twice those of the US.
The hungry American and British big boys ExxonMobil, Chevron, Texaco, BP and Shell took their juicy oil slices together with oil giants Total from France and ENI from Italy.
This imperial competition for resources has, of late, been interfaced with the use of force to effect illegal regime change.
An invasion of Syria under a humanitarian mandate would serve the same corporate interests as the Libya invasion and Iraq’s 2003 invasion and occupation.
The invasion might also bear the same consequences as that of Libya and Iraq.
The Syrian civil war, now well into its second year, has carried strategic benefits to the West.
Syria’s geographic location on the Mediterranean Sea makes it an obvious export centre for landlocked oil producers within the greater Middle East seeking to export their oil and gas reserves to European markets.
For this reason, Syria has been placed at the centre of a major effort by Western nations to pump cheap Middle East gas and oil supplies to Europe and beyond.
During the 10th Conference of the Committee of Intelligence and Security Services of Africa, which was held in Zimbabwe in May this year, African countries resolved that the continent should advance the African security architecture with a view to confront the belated Western forays into the continent.
The NDC is therefore evidence that Zimbabwe is making great strides towards that cause.