Morgan Tsvangirai and his MDC friends had the golden opportunity to end the dictatorship during the 2008 to 2013 GNU, for example. All they had to do was implement the democratic reforms designed to end Zanu PF’s undemocratic control over key State Institution such as ZEC, Police, Army, etc. They failed to get not even one reform implemented in five years. Not one!
Why, people have asked?
“MDC leaders were too busy enjoying themselves during the GNU, they forgot why they were there,” remarked one SADC leader, is sheer exasperation soon after Zanu PF had blatantly ridded the 2013 elections because no reforms to stop the vote rigging had been implemented.
There is no doubt that Robert Mugabe had gone the extra mile to ensure Tsvangirai & co. were given all the gravy train comforts the tyrant was granting his own Zanu PF cronies that had kept them as placid and malleable as soft mud until now. MDC members had the generous salaries and allowances, ministerial limos, a former white-owned farm for senor Welshman Ncube, a $4 million mansion for senor Tsvangirai, etc. To show their gratitude to the dictator MDC members became even more placid and malleable than Zanu PF thugs and they kicked the reforms into the prickly pear thicket.
Yes, MDC leaders failed to implement any democratic reforms during the GNU because they are corrupt but that does not explain why the party has failed to make any meaningful impact in getting these all-important reforms implemented since the rigged July 2013 elections. The truth is MDC leaders are not just breathtakingly corrupt they are also breathtakingly incompetent.
“The MDC has always argued that it was completely untenable and absurd for Justice Rita Makarau to hold three (3) positions as the ZEC chairperson, a sitting Supreme Court Judge as well as the Secretary of the Judicial Service Commission (JSC). We are, therefore, pleased to note that Justice Rita Makarau has relinquished one of her three positions,” commented MDC-T spokesman Obert Gutu.
“Surely, Zimbabwe has no shortage of suitably qualified and experienced legal personnel to occupy the vacant position of ZEC chairperson.
“The new ZEC chairperson must be a person of unparalleled integrity and solid impartiality. In view of the very limited time left before the holding of the next elections, the government has to move in very swiftly to initiate the process of appointing the new ZEC chairperson.”
There are a number of issues one can pick here, showing that senor Gutu has no clue what he talking about. Will focus on just three:
a) Zimbabwe has failed to
hold free, fair and credible elections ever since the country attained her
independence in 1980. It was not always Rita Makarau who was chairperson of ZEC
nor, was whoever was chairperson then, holding too many other positions. In any
case, Rita Makarau was appointed chairperson of ZEC during the GNU and MDC
leaders approved the appointment; no doubt they had their snouts in the feeding
trough to even notice.
b) It is not enough to
ask that the ZEC chairperson must be someone of “unparalleled integrity and
solid impartiality” when the rest of commissioners are Zanu PF agents in all but
name. If we are serious about ZEC delivering free, fair and credible elections
then we must implement the democratic reforms designed to end the undemocratic controls
Zanu PF has over the whole electoral process.
c) SADC leaders advised
Morgan Tsvangirai & co. not to contest the July 2013 elections without
first implementing the reforms. ‘If you go into elections next month,
you are going to lose; the elections are done,’ they were warned. MDC did not
listen then and they are still not listening now.
“The MDC shall always remain vigilant in looking out for any impediments to the holding of free and fair elections. In the interim, the relevant organs of our party shall continue to liaise and collaborate with ZEC in the ongoing preparations for next year's elections.”
Zanu PF corrupted ZEC, Police and other democratic institution for the single purpose of rigging elections and staying in power. The party has already made it clear, for those lacking the common sense to figure it out for themselves, that it is not going to reform itself out of office! Only a fool would therefore count on MDC’s call for reforms accomplishing anything especial when everyone in Zanu PF knows Tsvangirai & co. will take part in the elections without even one reform in place and regardless how flawed and illegal the process.
Morgan Tsvangirai and his MDC friends wasted their best chances to implement the democratic reforms during the GNU. It has taken some time for that political reality to sink in but the penny has dropped. MDC leaders know they will never get Zanu PF to implement the reforms and deliver free, fair and credible elections. They have since decided to contest elections with no reforms in place to win the few gravy train seats Zanu PF gives away to entice the opposition to contest elections.
For MDC to even suggest next year’s election could be free, fair and credible just because Rita Makarau has resigned as chairperson of ZEC goes to show just how naïve and stupid they are but, worse still, how far away we are to ever holding free and fair elections. Makarau’s departure does not even constitute the one swallow heralding the summer of freedom, she is just a feather at the most!
4 comments:
Movement for Democratic Change leader Welshman Ncube has urged the government to allow everyone - locally or internationally - to be allowed to observe the 2018 elections if there are free and fair.
"If we have nothing to hide we must be able to allow everyone, locally, international to come and observe our elections," said Ncube.
This is the kind of foolishness that has left us stuck in this mess for 37 years because there are many things outsiders have already picked up in the past and flagged which Welshman Ncube and his friends know about but are ignoring. We already know that we do not have a free media, that Zanu PF is looting billions of dollars from Marange to bankroll its political activities, that ZEC will not produce a verified voters’ roll, etc. If Ncube and his friends have decided against advice from such bodies as SADC leaders to contest next year’s elections without getting these glaring vote rigging irregularities addressed. We are told MDC has now devised Winning In Rigged Elections (WIRE) strategies. What exactly does Ncube want outside observers to do other than not the irregularities again?
SADC leaders could not condemn Zimbabwe’s rigged July 2013 elections because they warned MDC leaders not to contest the elections without putting in place the reforms designed to stop the rigging. When MDC leaders would not listen, there was very little SADC leaders can do.
Professor Ncube, it is not the presence of the outside observers that would guarantee free, fair and credible elections but the implementing of the democratic reforms designed to free ZEC, Police and all the other State Institution to carry out their statutory duties without fear and favour. You are going into next year’s elections with no reforms and you expect outside observers to do the Police’s work and arrest Zanu PF thugs who disturb the peace?
@ Paul Simon
The other dumbfounding truth is that the ‘coup’ was beginning to take a nasty turn as Mugabe was refusing to go thus piling pressure on the military generals to prove to the world that theirs was a ‘coup lite’ underwritten by popular demand. What better way to fight Mugabe than rope in the citizens themselves whose chokeful disdain for Mugabe was contained by the same military in order to diffuse mounting AU and SADC pressures.
Temporarily, citizens tasted freedom. How expedient that they would for once be allowed to demonstrate freely without running battles with heavily armed police and soldiers!
Furthermore, the notoriously corrupt Zimbabwe Republic Police disappeared from the roads. It became imperceptibly surreal that up to today, one can drive a stretch of 5km in Zimbabwe without running into menacingly extortionist police officers who harass, harangue and incarcerate anyone who cannot pay them a bribe. Ironically the rot was all sanctioned by top cops who got the bulk of the loot. It’s a set up. As the elections approach, the brute force of the military will be unleashed against the opposition, no doubt!
I agreed with your analysis until you got to the bit praising Tsvangirai.
“Citizens anxiously anticipated that Mnangagwa would infuse new faces as well as the tried and tested leadership of Morgan Tsvangirai which brought about massive economic turnaround for the period 2009 to 2013 after several years of misrule. Even as he steadfastly battles cancer, Tsvangirai still carries people’s hopes regardless of diminished prospects for progress. He epitomises the nation’s idea of freedom, economic progress, justice and equality. Zimbabweans are incredibly resilient, they will soldier on.”
1) Whilst it is true that there were very significant economic changes after the formation of the GNU it is wrong to attribute the changes to Tsvangirai and present them as proof of his leadership credentials. One has to consider where Zimbabwe was at the time. The scrapping of the Z$, which was done before the GNU was sworn in reduced the hyperinflation from 500 billion% to zero overnight.
2) How can Tsvangirai “epitomises the nation’s idea of freedom”? When it was his doing that not even one democratic reform design to end the Zanu PF dictatorship was implemented in five years of the GNU.
Winky D Sets Zaka Alight Against Political Violence Today!
It is all very well to be against political violence but we must also be realists. If there was political violence in Zaka next week, next month or next elections; what will Winky D do beside condemning it?
Heal Zimbabwe Trust has been staging its Peace Campaign up and down the country all in the name of making sure next year's elections are free of violence. Ask them about the democratic reforms and they pretend they have no ears to hear, eye to read or else it is all Greek!
If we are serious about end the culture of political violence then we must implement the democratic reforms to the Police, Judges, ZEC, etc. to deal with the political criminals decisively. It is disappointing that some people are making a career out of reinventing the democratic "wheel" and coming up with all manner of stupid solutions like triangle, octagon, etc.!
How long are we going to give our people false hope that they will finally have free, fair and credible elections? Frankly it would be better if those who do not want to deal with the meat of our political violence culture by dealing with the reforms would shut up and stop making all this unnatural noised that are getting us nowhere.
You might just as well ask; what is better to have you leg or hand cut off?
There is nothing good about being beaten. The Police are there to keep the law and not beat up people!
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