It was MDC's incompetence and not "violence" that gave Mugabe victory in 2013 as Raftopoulos claims!

What is Brian Raftopoulos wittering about, "Zanu PF’s and Mugabe’s overwhelming electoral ‘victory’ in July 2013 was the result of a combination of the continuing legacy of firmly inscribed memories of post-colonial violence, Zanu PF’s persistent legitimacy from the liberation struggle, the declining fortunes of the opposition MDCs, the combination of coercion and patronage by the ruling party in context of a reconstructed political economy, regional solidarity for the ‘party of liberation'!" All these are historic excuses that had a marginal effect on the outcome of the July 2013 elections whilst other others are in fact pure nonsense!

Yes Mugabe has often relied on violence to win elections, the wanton violence during the presidential run-off elections in 2008 was the worse in the country’s history. In the 2013 elections Mugabe knew the whole world was watching him like an eagle and therefore he did not use violence. To say that he did is a complete misrepresentation of the facts!

Mugabe won the 2013 elections because he had total control of the Police, Courts, ZEC and all the other state institution who all played key roles in the execution of his vote rigging plan. Mugabe had the Israeli company Nikuv corrupt the voters roll, for example, which enable him to deny nearly a million voters, mainly MDC supporters, on the day the vote because their names were deliberately posted in another Polling area other than that they expected to vote in.

Mugabe needed ZEC to turn a blind eye to his failure to produce a voters roll before the elections and the commission’s continued cooperation in hiding the voters roll, the smoking gun to the vote rigging.

Mugabe has also used the failure to produce a voters roll to cover up the hundreds of thousands of his own supporters who were bussed in to vote on voting day. The whole world saw the bussed in voters and the Police did not lift a finger to investigate!

Of course Mugabe would have never blatantly rigged the elections if MDC had carried out the democratic reforms as agreed in the GPA!

For Brian to dismiss MDC’s breath-taking incompetence in failing to implement not even one reform as “declining fortunes of the opposition MDCs” only goes to show how he has failed to comprehend the importance of the reform.

It is nonsense to suggest SADC sided with Mugabe and Zanu PF out of “regional solidarity for the ‘party of liberation'!" How many times did SADC leaders tell Tsvangirai and his MDC friends to follow the GPA roadmap and implement the reforms and how many times did MDC ignore their advice?

In a recent interview, Samuel Sipepa Nkomo, MDC leader, admitted that SADC and the international community advised MDC not to take part in the July 2013 elections without the reforms. Both SADC and the international community deserted MDC in sheer frustration when MDC once again ignored the advice.

I believe the international community would like to help Zimbabwe get out of this political and economic mess Mugabe has landed us in but only if we, Zimbabweans, can demonstrate that we are now serious about getting out of the mess. MDC’s breath-taking incompetence showed that we are not serious and when people like Brian Raftopoulos are not helping us address this very serious shortcoming by sweeping it under the carpet!