THE ELECTION marathon is now over and we all know now who gets what medal.
Cont Mhlanga
The pitch I hear from the MDC-T leadership is that Zanu PF stole the election.
They rigged! Please sons and daughters of the soil, let’s not be stupid. In this short article in simple language, I aim to talk to the MDC-T leadership led by Morgan Tsvangirai and not the ordinary membership.
Stop selling to your membership and the world this rigging dummy of the elections.
You do not need to, because you led your membership to this battle well aware that all the necessary reforms were not in place for a free and fair result.
You decided not to lead your membership to a protest at that point, but to play because you were taking chances that you would win. In fact, you were convinced that you would win.
If you had won by President Robert Mugabe’s margin, would you be saying the election was rigged? Would you be saying that you stole the election to win it by that margin?
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When you won the elections outright in 2008 and you had a valid case in your hands, you decided not to call your membership to protest at that point, but you aim to sell that to them today when you have lost with shocking margins.
Are you serious politicians or serious political activists or are you confusing the two? There are points in the struggle when protesting was very ideal for the MDC-T, but all those opportunities were lost.
When some people failed to register to participate in the election was one such opportunity. You should have protested at that point but you did not. Now is not the time.
To Roy Bennett, please do not take Zimbabweans for granted.
Your party lost these elections the day you went into the inclusive government and focused on wanting to look like Zanu PF while disconnecting yourselves from the people’s daily struggles.
Some of your councillors did not even want tea with biscuits at committee meetings. They wanted six-piece take-away foods.
Your MPs in Parliament went close to toyi-toying because they wanted cars similar to those Zanu PF had.
Your councillors played the “we are the smart ones game” with residents, auctioning their properties over rates they could not afford, blaming it on Zanu PF.
You Roy, as an MDC member, remained silent — so did the rest of them.
Now you want the same people you did not protect during their time of need to go to the streets to protest that you have lost!
Whose child do you want to be beaten up to a pulp by the riot police? Beaten to get people to positions so that they can auction their properties?
Get serious Roy. Your party lost elections a long time ago and not on July 31.
MDC leaders: You do not have to like Mugabe or vote for him, but there is a lot you can learn when it comes to political leadership.
When his party lost to yours in 2008, he called all his membership and told them that they were in the inclusive marriage because they had lost the election to your party and that they should go back to re-organise the party, address the challenges that led to them losing and go out and re-engage the people to win the elections to get themselves out of the situation.
They did and have hit back so hard that you think they rigged or stole the vote. He did not blame anyone for the loss of his party.
That is political leadership. You lead to win elections by all means possible.
Look at your lot now behaving like political activists blaming Zanu PF and Mugabe for your heavy election loss!
You don’t need to do that unless you are just a bunch of activists who want to use some political environment to raise attention and sympathy of those that can pay for your activism!
Unfortunately, Zimbabweans had not seen you as such. They looked up to you for serious political leadership to change their lives for the better. You have let them down.
You know very well like we all know that in an election all you have to do is win and form a government to implement your policies.
I expect you to accept your loss and sharing it with all your membership at this point, regrouping your leadership and evaluating what you did wrong and why that led to your loss. Don’t worry about what Zanu PF did wrong for you to lose the election.
You know for sure there is not going to be another election next month just because you are screaming to the last member that this one was rigged.
You know you can scream to the end of the world, but it won’t change that Zanu PF will form a government.
One has no need to scream about the voters’ roll after they lose the election. You do so before you contest the election.
It’s time to forget what went on in this election particularly if you lost it, and focus on what role you will play in challenging the policies of those that won and are in the government.
How you will expose corruption, bad policies, bad governance, abuse of State assets, inefficiency and so on? In the process you continue to promote your manifesto for the next election. The next election is not far off.
Five years in governance is a very short time. That is why other people want to stay in there forever hoping to finish what they begun.
Your party is full of young, positive people who have so much time ahead of them and you don’t need to make them cry over some spilt election water.
There are great lessons that you can learn from this loss that can make your party come out stronger in the next election.
You put up an excellent fight and you should be congratulating yourselve and membership for that.
The young people in your party can re-organise, focus and win the next election in a very big way and achieve for Zimbabwe what they set out to achieve for the country many years ago.
Going on singing this stupid song of rigging will only serve to make great fighters like you look stupid.
If you as MDC leaders who were part of the government with your competitors Zanu PF, failed to uncover the national plot well before the election day, then I would be very worried for Zimbabwe to be led by that quality of such security blind leaders, unless you are admitting that Zanu PF did it while you were fast asleep.
In that case then, they are better off governing Zimbabwe than your lot. Let’s not be stupid.
My Mozambique hero Samora Machel would say to his membership and forces at times like these, Aluta Continua and every one would pick themselves up and move on to the winning line.
So can you without this funny chorus on rigging!
