It is widely acknowledged that mass stay-away called by MDC was a “flop” as one International Media House put it. I would attribute the failure to three things; first, wrong timing – if the stay away was called two or three days after the election the response would have been totally different. MDC, in its wisdom decided there was to be no mass action and called for “patience”.
Two, poor planning; most people did not even know there was a mass protest. And because the end objective was not clear, it failed to capture the public’s imagination and passion.
And three, there was no one leading the protest. The issue of poor leadership is something that has dogged MDC ever since its formation in 1999. We are quick at condemning Mugabe for hanging on to power long after his sell-by date but the same is true of Tsvangirai.
When Zimbabweans voted for Tsvangirai and MDC on 29 March 2008 they expected MDC to use that mandate to take charge of the country. Tsvangirai’s dithering has allowed Mugabe to step in and deploy his thugs who are sweeping the country terrorising the people. Is it too much to expect of Tsvangirai and MDC to come up with something to stop this madness?!
MDC should on mass visit the victims of the political violence in hospitals, in prisons and attend funerals of those murdered. That would show the public they are not alone none have they been forgotten. If Mugabe should decide to arrest people for attending funerals or for visiting prisoners then so be it! Let him fill all the jails, hospitals and mortuaries.
This time the Zimbabwe people will be fighting Mugabe’s thugs – peaceful but firm passive resistance- on their own turf in their own terms. It is not a crime to visit someone in prison or in hospital or to attend a funeral. If Mugabe wants these mass gathering to stop then he MUST stop his thugs throwing innocent people in prison, the beating and murdering them
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