Many people have often described President Mugabe as a ‘cunning fellow’; they are right. One of the ways he has shown his cunningness is to keep his opponents doing the wrong thing even when they have realised they are on the wrong track by making them believe that if they just put an extra effort they will have they cherished prize.
Even intellectuals like former UZ lecturer, Brain Raftopoulos have fallen head-long into President Mugabe’s cunning traps.
“Let us remember that Mugabe is unwilling to relinquish power – as such he will resort to violence, rigging and intimidation of known opposition supporter,” Raftopoulos told SABC
“Mugabe wants to retain power by hook and crook. The rigging system is complicated,” he readily admitted.
“I am worried about the fact that we have three opposition coalitions instead of one. If all opposition parties come together they will defeat Mugabe and Zanu PF,” he maintained.
To those not altogether familiar at just how “complicated” Mugabe’s vote rigging is; the tyrant ordered a recount of the March 2008 vote in which Tsvangirai had got 73%, by President Mugabe’s own admission. After SIX WEEKS of cooking up the figures Tsvangirai’s vote was whittled down to 47%, enough to force the run-off.
During the run-off President Mugabe unleashed the war veterans, the Army, Police and CIO to punish the people for having rejected him in the March vote. In the June vote, he overhauled Tsvangirai’s 73% to win with a landslide 84%. This time the result was declared within hours of polling stations closing, no need for the six week recount.
Of course, it was not the failure to have a untied opposition that costed Tsvangirai the 2008 elections. The only way Tsvangirai could ever be certain of electoral victory was for the country to implement the democratic reforms designed to stop cooking up the figures, using wanton violence to force people to vote for him. Calling for opposition unity is just a red herring!
President Mugabe has since improved the sophistication of his vote machinery; he is using the billions of dollars looted Marange diamonds to bankroll many subtle vote rigging schemes. Only last week he promised to buy each of the country’s 226 Chiefs an Isuzu Twin-cab truck at a total cost of $6 million. Chiefs have frogmarched people to attend Zanu PF rallies and then to vote for the party and Chief Charumbira, the leader of the Chiefs, has already promised President Mugabe that Chiefs will be campaigning for him.
4 comments:
It is amazing that so many Zimbabweans are determined to contest next year's elections regardless of the fact that with no reforms Zanu PF will, as sure as the certainty of the sun rising tomorrow, rig the vote. The regime is rigging the vote already by all these political shenanigans with the voter registration exercise. First the regime delayed the start of the voter registration and then it started throwing spanners in the whole exercise by claiming there no VR9 forms, take 2 hours to register one voter instead of the promised 5 minutes, etc. There is no doubt that ZEC will not register every one of the 7 million wishing to register and, worse still, will never produce a verified voters' roll.
With all the mountain of evidence of how Zanu PF has rigged elections in the past and mounting evidence that the regime is rigging next year's elections already how can anyone, much less one calling themself an academic still argue for holding elections with no reforms. It does not make any sense!
Zimbabwe’s opposition parties are bending over backs just to find an excuse for contesting these flawed elections rather do the logic and obvious thing here – demand the implementation of the reforms so there are free, fair and credible elections.
The ordinary Zimbabweans have risked life and limb to elect MDC leaders on the understanding they would bring democratic change, including free, fair and credible election. But since MDC leaders tasted the sweetness of power they very quickly forgot about the reforms and now they are the ones supporting Zanu PF’s dirty tyrannical vote rigging schemes.
President Mugabe very quickly learnt some after the formation of the GNU that Tsvangirai and his MDC friends are corrupt and greed, they will sell-out on free and fair elections just as his own Zanu PF thugs sold-out on freedom and human rights for povo given the right inducements. The tyrant was right! President Mugabe is giving away a few gravy train seats to those opposition members willing to forget free and fair elections. MDC leaders are selling out for scraps!
It is interesting that Basikiti is advising Tsvangirai to hand over power but never gave the same advice to his former boss, President Robert Mugabe. The two men's ill health aside, they have overstayed with precious little to show for their years as leaderof the respective parties. It is tempting to say Basikiti has learnt something and now appreciate the importance of quality leaders. But alas, that is not so.
“If…Tsvangirai is overwhelmed by current medical procedures let’s take a young focused candidate in the name of…Chamisa,” said Basikiti.
Chamisa a "focused candidate"??? Rubbish!! Was Chamisa not in the GNU cabinet? What did reform did he implement in the five years if he is a focused leader?
Zimbabwe needs focused and competent leaders and we are not going to get such men and women from recycling the same deadwood in the form of the likes of Chamisa, Basikiti or any of the MDC or Zanu PF rejects!
“People who deposit their money in the bank and are unable to withdraw it are docile and mentally retarded,” said the former minister Tshinga Dube, to the applause from fellow legislators at the Victoria Falls meeting.
“Our situation is because of a failed economy but nothing is being done, but the leadership is good at finding scape goats,” he told NewZimbabwe.com in a later interview.
“Just go around the cities and towns and see how people stand in queues day in, day out and not getting their money.
“They go home and do the same thing every day. And they don’t complain, is that normal.”
The former minister is spot on but the nation is getting sick and tired of these politicians who talk sense when they are no longer in power. No doubt Dube, like Mujuru, will claim he lost his voice when he was in cabinet. She did not see anything wrong in Zanu PF’s rule because her puppy eyes had not opened. Some dog breed, she is, that takes 34 years just to open their eyes!
President Mugabe has been able to treat the populous with total contempt because he knew he can rig elections to secure a landslide victory again and again. Force him to hold free, fair and credible elections and his mojo arrogance will evaporate like mist in the warming Africa morning sun. All we need is to get the democratic reform implemented to ensure free and fair elections.
We should have had the reforms implemented during the GNU if MDC leaders had not sold-out and they took the bribes and failed to get even one reform implemented. Even now we would have the reforms implemented if MDC and a few more opposition parties would not contest the flawed elections.
The International Monetary Fund (IMF) has blamed excessive government spending for worsening the crisis, warning that if not tempered, the problem could worsen the cash shortages.
“Excessive government spending, if continued, could exacerbate the cash scarcity, further jeopardize the health of the external and financial sectors, and, ultimately, fuel inflation,” the IMF said earlier this year.
Finance minister Ignatius Chombo revealed last week that the government deficit would, this year, hit $1.82 billion, against a target of $400 million.
At a time when Zanu PF is imploding one would think the opposition will be cashing in. If there was ever any doubt that the people of Zimbabwe have lost confidence in the opposition this is it! Most people can see that Zanu PF is going to rig the elections just as easily as the party rigged the last elections. Only a first class fool would believe the nonsense of MDC winning rigged elections.
People risked life and limb to elect MDC leaders to implement reforms and deliver free and fair elections and not this nonsense of winning rigged elections. How many rigged elections has MDC failed to win so far and we are supposed to believe the party will win rigged elections next year? And if they don't? We are to suffer the consequences again!
Post a Comment