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Zimbabwe 2008: Decision Time #2 – The final mile
Posted on May 12th 2008
The race is definitely on and notwithstanding the provisions of the Zimbabwean electoral laws, no one including the Zimbabwean Electoral Commission (ZEC) knows precisely when the run off will be held.It now turns out that the ZEC is conveniently out of funds when it is common cause that the incumbent President needs time to refuel and hopefully poison the atmosphere sufficiently to discredit his nemesis to his electoral advantage.
Ordinarily common problems call for common sense but the Zimbabwean crisis is different. At this defining hour in the nation's post colonial history, the country is being run by a cabinet whose legitimacy is questionable and whose President has lost the trust of his people to be a credible custodian of political morality.
The last mile is always a decisive one and it would be wrong to assume otherwise given the nature and context of the contestation for power in Zimbabwe.
For the first time, President Mugabe is going travel this last mile of his political career as a wounded animal, albeit armed with poisonous instruments targeted at defenceless and vulnerable people. President Mugabe still believes that the justice of his cause is the justice of his tactics. It is evident that President Mugabe and his former ruling party have not accepted that the people who voted for the opposition did so voluntarily and as such a different outcome should be expected in the run off election.
ZANU-PF would like to convince the Zimbabwean public that the election ought to be about whether Zimbabwe should revert to its former colonial status or remain under the control of the incumbent President who evidently has little to offer rather than vernom against his opponents. What is clear is that ZANU-PF has not accepted that Zimbabweans can make their own rational political choices.
Unlike business where the customer is king, politics has a different modus operandi requiring competitors to throw mud at each other so that voters can decide who looks better than the other.
President Mugabe is advantaged in the game as he has the state machinery at his disposal to use to discredit his opponent. Regrettably, after 28 years of independence, the game of politics in Zimbabwe has not been transformed to a higher level where serious conversations about the future of the country can be held.
The strategies and tactics of President Mugabe are as predictable as night follows day. As expected, he will continue to make the case that Tsvangirai is less Zimbabwean than him and that a vote for Tsvangirai will not be in the national interest.
Before the 29th March election, President Mugabe had made the case that MDC was an agent of imperialism but unfortunately the voters did not buy this. Subsequent to the election, President Mugabe has accepted the allegation as true that the MDC bought its votes as he genuinely believes that no rational Zimbabwean can conceivably think that Tsvangirai and MDC symbolizes the change that the country needs.
The sanction issue will gain traction in the run off. President Mugabe will argue that he has been betrayed by his colleagues in SADC who promised that if a deal is struck paving the way for elections; Zimbabwe would be rewarded with the lifting of the sanctions. The absence of a spirited call for the lifting of sanctions by SADC will naturally be used by President Mugabe as a pretext for changing the ground rules for the run off.
President Mugabe will argue that all bets should be off since the light at the end of the tunnel appears to be Tsvangirai's train carrying a lot of unwelcome passengers. After the first phase of the elections, President Mugabe is convinced that Tsvangirai's train is carrying in its first class cabin former white farmers.President Mugabe is behaving as if he must have a say on who Tsvangirai should trust in his camp. While President Mugabe can ask the country to look east he has not accepted that Tsvangirai is also entitled to ask Zimbabweans to look west. Even President Mugabe is looking west in so far as he desire to get the sanctions lifted is concerned but has not accepted that the West is fully entitled to decide who they should trust with their money after their experience with him over the last 28 years.
President Mugabe was a darling of the same west until they discovered that their investment in him had produced negative returns not only for them but for the people of Zimbabwe many of whom are seeking asylum in the West.
President Mugabe will use the argument that the only segment of the Zimbabwean population that is in a hurry to get him out of power can only be former white farmers. Accordingly, he will continue to argue giving up power to Tsvangirai will necessarily lead to a reversal of the land reform program.
President Mugabe is of the view that the land reform program is irreversible and by putting the land issue at the centre of the contestation of power he has successfully diverted attention from his record on other nation building issues that ought to have been at the centre of the national democratic revolution.
Zimbabwe needs to turn a new leaf and yet it appears that President Mugabe would rather remain in power fully cognisant of the fact that he run out of steam and the country will be better served if he were to take a back seat. Is there anything new that can be expected from President Mugabe?
The Zimbabwean voters have already shown President Mugabe a yellow card and in so doing they have signalled that they need change and now want to reclaim their future.
Common sense would call for President Mugabe to change the tone of politics on the recognition that out of four candidates, Tsvangirai was rated as number one.
History has already recorded that Tsvangirai has beaten President Mugabe in a race in which President Mugabe controlled everything except the will of the people. Surely the more than a million voters who selected Tsvangirai cannot all have been bribed by the British and Americans. At some stage, the will of the people must and should be respected.
Will President Mugabe acknowledge Tsvangirai as the favourite horse in this final mile? Will he continue to invest in gutter politics? What should the response of Zimbabweans be in this final mile?
We know that intimidation is good currency for any discredited politician. It is not unexpected that President Mugabe's people regard the last mile as one in which terror should take centre stage. Evidence is abundant on the ground that the run off will be conducted under different rules to justify its reclassification as a totally new election. Already the rules are being manipulated to favour the underdog and it is evident that when the electoral laws were put in place no one could have imagined that President Mugabe would be a victim.
Because Zimbabwe is too important to all who care about it, this is a time that differences must be put asunder and all good minds be deployed to make sure that this be the final mile for President Mugabe. He needs a rest and it is important, therefore, that all the Zimbabweans in the diaspora who are immune from intimidation and are registered to vote be energised to regard this last mile as theirs and quietly and purposefully go home and vote while encouraging those at home not to succumb to fear.
The Presidential vote is a national referendum on who should preside over the executive branch of the state for the next five years. Just pause to think and imagine a Zimbabwe after five years under President Mugabe. If you see light at the end of the tunnel then do nothing but remain a passenger.
President Mugabe's record is known as are his views on the Zimbabwe he wants to see. Nothing much will change for the better if he were to be elected and deep in his veins he knows that the game is up.
Will Zimbabweans once again rise to the challenge? Tsvangirai has accepted to be in the race and the rest must surely fall on all Zimbabweans who have the right to vote to exercise their historic duty in the name of all future generations who will naturally look at this last mile as the golden mile. The future is within grasp and the past is full of pain to allow for any pontification.
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VaMawere. Well said.
I have a question though:
The last illustration in your article is powerful because it could be viewed as a nation reaching out for change. In the event that Mugabe reimposes himself again contrary to the will of the people in the upcoming run-off, what should the international community do?
I share n Mwana we kumusha's concerns.I think its safe to conclude, given past track record that the result of the run-off will not be respected unless it reflects a victory for Mugabe. If Zimbabweans in the diaspora are to spend their hard-earned resources to fly back to Zimbabwe to vote, as you suggest risking life and limb in the process, then surely they have got to have strong motivation, perhaps in the form of some reassurance from the International community, and particularly from SADC, that they will not leave Zimbabweans in the lurch when the final round is stolen.After all ZANU PF has already admitted that they will not accept an MDC victory
Iwe Takesure, the image of the MDC Team above is reflective of what is currently happening in Zimbabwe & is also reflective of what will happen going forward unless the international community affords we the willing some form of protection.
LETS ALL SECURE TICKETS FOR RUN OFF
Whether registered or not,lets all try to be in Zimbabwe preferably in the rural areas during the runoff.
Our presence will give voters reassuarance and support that they have to do it for the last time.
It is fact that Mugabe still has support in Zimbabwe,with or without rigging Mugabe got more than 40% and Zanu-PF has more than 90 parliamentary seats.May i hail people from Matabeleland for rejecting Mugabe despite massive intimidation and victimisation over the years,this must educate Zanu-PF that intimidation will not work.On the same note may i condemn our mothers,fathers,brothers and sisters from the Karanga,Manyika and Mazezuru who continue to back Mugabe despite dismal failure that is there for everyone to see.
Mugabe’s state machinery is not as strong as Tsvangirai’s British backed funding and regime change sanctions. The similarity between the two propaganda methods is that they are aimed at annihilating the ordinary Zimbabwean. We are Zimbabweans and it is true that we love our country differently. In as far as we belittle the economic effects of regime change agenda by western powers in order to have Mugabe out of office we are also ridiculing our independence struggle for the national edifice as if it was a mere struggle for food. The majority of keyboard punchers here do not comprehend the degree of hunger and misery our families are experiencing as they are inflicted by Mugabe and Tsvangirai. Some of us cry like so…! With the current hunger never experienced before we will vote Tsvangirai “madhongi achikuma!” The Zanuits can choose to kill us but “kusi kufa ndekupi? I have not seen a bottle of cooking oil, salt or margarine in the last two months in all chain stores in Borrowdale, Mount Pleasant, Chisipite or Avondale. If the wealthiest of this nation can not have these basics God redeem the situation among the less privileged. Mugabe said mabhunu are bad but now that the whites are “gone” we suffer more, our white farmer Mr. Nicole never let his subjects/employees (vanhu vake) suffer as what Mugabe has put us through. Sure, sure, if it is about sovereignty we rather choose life for our children. We don’t eat sovereignty after all the whites demarcated this land. Inga Mugabe is old what else does he still want in this life? Mugabe’s people are wearing two-three bellies each while we are slim to the bone. Does Mugabe people care about decomposing bodies in non-refrigerated mortuaries? Now he is sending the army to beat us, why don’t they beat Tsvangirai wacho? If it was not sisi mudhiasipora we will be dead by now. Iyo hondo yacho, did he fight it alone? We were beaten negandanga during the war now we are being beaten by the soldiers weduwee! I am afraid the situation at hand is horrendous, it is the tide between stomach economics against free conscience. Some of us shout like so….! Who is Tsvangirai? When we were bombed in gorongoza he was busy selecting neck ties for his promotion in a white dominated Trojan mine. He calls our liberation struggle a bush war! He promises hunger unto people until they know how to vote for mabhunu through him. He brought untold suffering to the masses in his participation in the Zimbabwe Democracy Bill of USA, he is a direct proxy of british supremacy in Africa. Tsvangirai even suggest that South Africa must switch off electricity sent to Zimbabwe in order to effect regime change. Blair glaringly tells his parliament that they support MDC financially and otherwise for whose purpose? Is it not the same house that denied us sovereign rights during the chimurenga wars? Did we not fight the white supremacy establishment with sellouts like Tsvangirai before? What policies does Tsvangirai want to bring about land, industry and mineral resources? If Tsvangirai is a man of his own let him announce his economic policies apart from being promised money by the defeated and wounded british establishment. If mutengesi Tsvangirai so love the people why is he not denouncing sanctions but appreciating the british and Australians. Are they not the same British who promised to compensate land when we wanted all of it at Lancaster 1978? We will not go down the aborigine way, never! We are not deterred by Tsvangirai’s folly even the bible is full of examples of him like Judas, Tsvangirai chimbwasungata, we will fight whoever with a mission to reverse the gains of our struggle by bringing back such inhuman colonisers back into our future. We attained our political freedom fighting Tsvangirai’s backers and we will attain our economic independence fighting them again. Forget Tsvangirai and his short memory if he has any memory at all, the British puppet could not go further than primary school grade seven how can he know about Nehanda Nyakasikana and the history of the chimurenga and chindunduma uprising struggles of the dzimbabwe people. Our masses may not all know the essence of the struggle as is always the case and we will again use methodologies that put the success of the revolution first. As is with any struggle there will be casualties of friends and dear ones, we can not afford to fold back our hands and give in to the enemy now. Tsvangirai does not understand that we invited Mugabe to Zanla, he thinks he is fighting Mugabe yet it is the revolution he keeps mocking. Camaradas, the whole oppressed world is focusing on our resolve to defeat imperialism with meager resources we have, we are under the spotlight of a subjugated humanity, our triumph is theirs too! Aluta Continua! Victory or Death! It is in nature that we salute the hand that feed us and those enemies of a free nationalist state passionately know that. Soldiers are being deployed to quell any form of food propaganda, instilling fear unto the people, hunting down perpetrators of violence and NGO promoters of regime change. ZANU and MDC hooligans are burning houses that belong to their political enemies. Boys dzejambanja are waiting for their payouts from both sides of the political divide to cause untold suffering to any ordinary man perceived an enemy. International mercenaries are forming training concentrations in and around the country recruiting the unemployed youths. It is final fire time for the war of dominion is about to be decided. Mugabe needs up till July to propagate his message using state apparatus while Tsvangirai had long chosen July before the harmonized elections for he is certain that Zimbabwe will be almost at ground zero economically. Miracles happen and I do so believe that if no miracle visits our part of the hemisphere, pandemonium will escalate to uncontainable levels of shame. Will it be in the name of Mugabe or Tsvangirai that we will use to blame the state of affairs then? NO! NO! NO! If my brother is down or ill we must blame those sane ones for not raising him up or coming up with a cure! The Mugabe – Tsvangirai madness, the lunatic dominion of African resources, the inhuman wars of multi-corporatism, the idiotic retribution hostilities of colonial paybacks, the skewed tentacles of insatiable euro-globalisation, psychotic rivalry of anti-Mugabe personal feuds, ALL and more have a negative bearing to the glorious history of African emancipation. I so believe in the vivid miracle created by works of man, this miracle is underscored in UNITY OF PURPOSE. All courageous people of the world today who are in the competence to positively intervene in the Zimbabwean discourse must engage, encourage and accomplish a united front to form an acceptable government that will save the people of Zimbabwe. It will be these courageous men whom history of humanity will blame for them not having taken action. They say man has psych but I think ants have better psych for ants never destroy the mud hills they build together.
in 1980 zimbabweans were faced with 2 choices,the first choice vote Smith and he will continue with his colonial mentality and more will die as evil as he was and as hard hearted as he was he stood for Presidential elections and he and his party fell by the way side the second but rather obvious one vote Zanu Pf and the guerilla movement and you breathe.those who voted the guerillas had something in mind they were cutting back on losses and just like any election in zimbabwe there was violence on the eve of the election and after the election.The country side was tired with violence they had seen violence of the highest quality being perpetrated on them by both Smith and the guerillas.they chose a better evil an evil that offered a better life not knowing that a few weeks down the line the same revolution will come to eat them.It happened in Matebeleland and Midlands.The people in 1980 were cutting back on their losses they had lost crops and animals to both foes.they say when 2 elephants fight its the grass that suffered but if the grass was going to decide on which elephant it wanted then what....they have degrees in violence they confessed it,the history of Zanu Pf is filled with violence.
Notwithstanding my brains towards the same cause of freedom and the likes.I extend my thanks to all who have put up comment on this article.Brains behind this!
Dr Blair
Mutumwa Dziva Mawere (born January 11, 1960 in Bindura, Zimbabwe), is an African business executive, pioneer, financier, banker and entrepreneur best known as the founder and Chairman of Africa Resources Limited ("ARL"). He is known for having built one of the most powerful and influential corporations in Zimbabwe's history
Patriotic Zimbabweans in the Diaspora should go and vote on the run-off, and this should not be conditional on any assurances from SADC or the international community. The Zimbabwean political stalemate is now an international discussion point and the entire world is watching Zimbabwe closely. The UN, AU and SADC bodies are focusing on the Zimbabwean election. The international community, and indeed SADC, will stand by the people of Zimbabwe and I don't foresee Mugabe successfully subverting the will of the people after the run-off. Let us not even think about how much its going to cost us to go to Zimbabwe and vote, this is nothing in comparison to the benefits in the form of better prospects for a country in a quagmire - OUR COUNTRY! We are presented here with a 'rare' chance to save our country from total collapse, I am sure we can pay any price to save our country. Winning elections is about numbers, and us in the Diaspora make a very good number. Let us be counted at this important juncture in the history of our country.