“Kenya's
opposition leader Raila Odinga has just announced that he's not
"ready" to take part in a planned re-run of the country's
presidential election,” reported Bulawayo 24.
“Mr Odinga said he wanted "legal and
constitutional guarantees" in place before agreeing to take part.
“He also called for changes to the country's electoral commission, which was blamed by the Supreme Court for irregularities which led to the August election being annulled.”
“He also called for changes to the country's electoral commission, which was blamed by the Supreme Court for irregularities which led to the August election being annulled.”
These are logical and very reasonable demands!
What is the point in the nation going through
yet another election process when there are no guarantees that the criminal
vote rigging of yesterday will not be repeated? Election fraud is a very
serious crime and the only way to show the world and would-be fraudsters that
the nation will not tolerate it, is by punishing all those involved in last
month’s vote rigging.
To allow the crooks to walk scot free is
unforgivable. To let the go scot free and allow the same criminals to stay in
their jobs and manage the rerun election, as Uhuru Kenyatta is suggesting, is
an insult to the nation and a mockery of justice. This is tantamount to challenging
the crooks to rig the vote again but make sure they do a better job of covering
their tracks, this time.
The constitution weakness identifies by the
court must be addressed, before the rerun.
Only a fool would ever agree to participate in
a process they know is flawed to favour of their opponent. The people
themselves must have total confidence in the electoral process because their free
vote is their only guarantee of a meaningful say in the governance of the
country. The importance of ensuring free and fair elections is the one thing
Tsvangirai has clearly failed to grasp.
A verified voters’ roll is a key document in
fight to stop vote rigging. Yet Morgan Tsvangirai surprised everyone by
agreeing to contesting the July 2013 with no verifiable voters roll in place
although constitution demands that one must be released at least one month
before voting day. The regime has
stubbornly refuse to release the voters roll to this day. He has allowed the
same ZEC officials who failed to produce a verifiable 2013 voters’ roll to managing
next year’s elections. Even this early in the election cycle it is clear ZEC
will not release a verifiable 2018 voters’ roll as stipulated in the
constitution. MDC will contest the flawed elections regardless.
As for the far reaching democratic reforms to
restore the independence of ZEC, Judiciary, Public Media, etc.; Tsvangirai,
unlike Odinga, has left them all untouched even when he had the power to implement
them during the GNU. The recent ruling to annul the election results proves the
independence of Kenya’s Supreme Court, at least for now. Uhuru Kenyatta has
already threatened to “fix” the court if he wins the rerun. No Zimbabwean court
would ever make a similar judgement because they are still shackles Zanu PF.
As much as Zimbabweans would like to compare
our political situation with what Kenya is going through, the truth is the two
countries are moving in different and opposite directions. During the GNU, Raila
Odinga implemented the democratic reforms and dismantled the one-party
dictatorship. Kenya is now grappling with the problem of making the young
democracy take root in the face of those like Uhuru Kenyatta who are keen to re-impose
the dictatorship by hook and by crook.
In Zimbabwe, the Zanu PF was never dismantled and
so nothing has changed. Tsvangirai and his MDC friends have abandoned the
aspiration for free, fair and credible elections, the holy grail of democracy. The
party claims “it is now smarter and has devised new strategies to Win In Rigged
Elections, (WIRE) for short,” MDC-T spokesman Obert Gutu explained on Zimeye
LIVE last week.
The only strategy to defeat vote rigging is
stopping the rigging, implement the democratic reforms in this case. None of
the WIRE strategies are seeking to implement the reforms and so they are all
totally useless. WIRE is just MDC-T’s latest excuse to justify contesting the
flawed elections again for the umpteenth time knowing fully well the elections
will be rigged.
I salute Raila Odinga for rightly demanding
that everything necessary to ensure the vote is free, fair and credible in the
presidential rerun in Kenya before voting is allowed to go ahead. On the other
hand, Morgan Tsvangirai, with his WIRE strategy mentality would have gone into
the elections with not even one reform in place.
37 years of gross mismanagement and rampant
corruption has left Zimbabwe’s economy in ruins. Zimbabwean are today the
poorest in Africa, that should speak volumes of the seriousness of our present
situation. Zimbabwe is tittering on the edge of economic collapse and political
instability. One false move and the country will tumble over into the abyss;
another rig election could well be that false move!
The nation’s political stability and with it
the very lives of hundreds of thousands innocent Zimbabweans is at stake if the
elections are rigged. And to risk it all on the basis of MDC’s feeble WIRE
strategies is madness.
We must learn from Raila Odinga has done to
save Kenya from the nightmare of one-party dictatorship; we must demand the
implementation of the democratic reforms to guarantee free, fair and credible
elections BEFORE the next elections can be held!
The people of Zimbabwe know that Zanu PF has been blatantly rigging the vote and those telling them otherwise are wasting their time.
ReplyDeleteMillions of Zimbabweans were harassed, beaten and/or raped and over 500 were murdered in cold blood in 2008 in Mugabe’s operation “Mavhotera papi!” (Whom did you vote for!) One can tell the people that they are free to vote forever they please, when nothing was ever done to punish those who masterminded and carried out Mavhora papi, the people would be very foolish to believe that nonsense. Indeed, some of those responsible for the violence, still remind the people they will be punished again if Zanu PF lose the vote.
The people know the opposition have done nothing to protect them from Zanu PF harassment, beating or worse and so protect themselves from certain abuse, they allow themselves to be frogmarch to rallies and then to vote for Zanu PF, etc.
You can tell a blind man there no maize in his plate of rice and he will believe you. You can say what like about the hot chilli in his relish; he will know for himself if there is hot chilli.
All this voter education is not only wasting time but worse still it is counterproductive. The most logical thing to do right now is not to take any part in an electoral process that everyone knows will be rigged. We must demand the implementation of reforms BEFORE elections. To take part in the elections in any way would be considered participating and as long as people participate Zanu PF will never implement the reforms and so people will never have free, fair and credible elections.
There are too many donors with money to waste bankrolling some of these totally pointless vote education programme. Zanu PF needs people to participate in the flawed electoral process, to give it some modicum of credibility. There is no doubt that Zanu PF itself is now paying for many of these voter education programmes!
Even if Raila Odinga was given rock solid guarantees of winning the presidential rerun with no reforms in place and the same election officials, I would say he must still insist on the reforms being implemented and the corrupt officials fired. As a matter of principle and establishing a good precedence; if something is serious wrong with a system, you fix it immediately and if someone is found to be corrupt they must be punished there and then.
ReplyDeleteIf Odinga was to contest the rerun with the same corrupt officials running the show and no reforms implemented, what excuse will he have for complaining that the process was rigged by the same corrupt officials using the same loop-holes. Even if he was cocksure of it but does not have the evidence, he will have no leg to stand on. He will only have himself to blame for having agreed to the contest going ahead without fixing known system problems first.
Margaret Dongo successfully challenged the 1995 Harare South parliamentary result on the basis there was widespread vote rigging. She did not ask for any far reaching democratic reforms and the firing of the corrupt officials involved Zimbabwe has seen similar vote rigging and worse happen again and again. Ms Dongo won the rerun in 1995 but lost all the other elections after that, no doubt a victim of the regime’s well-funded and sophisticated vote rigging machinery.
Dongo was concern with winning the rerun and nothing else beyond that. She did not ask for changes to end the vote rigging and left it to the regime to take the initiative and develop vote rigging tricks that are harder to detect. Morgan Tsvangirai is even worse that Dongo; he had the opportunity to implement the reforms and failed to do so.
Of course, Tsvangirai’s blundering incompetence has become the single biggest impediment in Zimbabwe’s search for democracy, the more so because many people still considers him the nation’s champion for the cause.
After his treasonous betrayal during the GNU, Zimbabweans should have deserted Tsvangirai in droves, the fact that they are many who still follow him is a measure of how many Zimbabweans still follow leaders blindly, no questions asked. With such a myopic and naïve electorate, it is little wonder the country is sinking in its own sewage. Unless these people snap out of their mental comatose, this nation is doomed!
@ Ring master
ReplyDeleteThe article was comparing Tsvangirai to Raila Odinga because the two were PM in a GNU tasked to implement the reforms. Whilst the later got the reforms implemented the former failed to get even one reform implemented because he and his MDC colleague are breathtakingly corrupt and incompetent.
You can compare Tsvangirai to Dongo or whoever else you wish but that will not change the historic facts of his own pathetic performance.
Zimbabwe's immediate challenge is whether to follow Tsvangirai into yet another flawed electoral process or to stand firm and demand the reform before elections. Of course, it is madness contesting an election knowing the result is already pre-determined, yet many people like you would do it for no better reason than "I don't know where the good leaders are who should do better than him"! How stupid is that! You would walk into a crocodile infested river because Tsvangirai tell you to!
The refusal to participate in flawed elections is the logic thing to do and you do not need a political party or leader to tell you what to do here because it is self -evident. SADC leaders are not stupid, they knew the July 2013 elections were a sham but if that is what the people of Zimbabwe wanted then it was not their business to interfere. It was SADC leaders who suggested we boycott the elections, but we chose to ignore them.
On the other hand, if Zimbabweans make it crystal clear they are sick and tired of rigged elections of course SADC will condemn the sham elections. It is now up to us to show the world that we are ready for free, fair and credible elections by rejecting flawed elections.
@ Chiremba
ReplyDelete“Tsvangirai and others have been arrested, brutalised and visibly led NERA demonstrations while you discouraged them in typical Zanu fashion,” you say.
We have been here before!
President Mugabe and many of his cronies fought the war of liberation and were beaten and imprisoned by the white racist regime. After independence, they are the one who have systematically denied the people their freedoms and basic human rights including the right to free, fair and credible elections and even the right to life. It is conceivable that Tsvangirai and his MDC colleague can be corrupt and incompetent although they too were arrested, beaten, etc. by the Zanu PF regime!
To even suggest that Tsvangirai should be above criticism because he was beaten, arrested, etc. by Zanu PF is as nonsensical as suggesting the President Mugabe should be above criticism for all the corruption and murders because he is a liberation war hero.
Why would a Zanu PF agent be fighting for free, fair and credible elections? You are really scrapping the bottom of the barrel now!
MDC leaders sold-out on the fight for free, fair and credible elections along, along time ago and that is why they failed to get even one reform implemented during the GNU and contested flawed 2013 elections. Right now they are determined to contest next year's elections even thou they know Zanu PF will rig the vote, they do not care. All they care about is that they win the few gravy train seats that Zanu PF gives away as bribes for contrsting flawed elections.
ReplyDeleteThe people of Zimbabwe have been slow to notice when their political leaders have failed them being it because they are corrupt or incompetent or both. MDC leaders have sold-out and the sooner Zimbabweans wake up to this reality the sooner the nation can hope to finally have the reforms implemented.