By A Correspondent- The Nelson Chamisa-led MDC’s secretary for elections, Jacob Mafume, has defended his party which suffered heavily after receiving only 12% of the vote in a Chimanimani Ward by-elections, saying Zanu-PF did not win but simply retained the seat through buying votes using food aid.

Mafume was put to task by Zimbabweans on social media as to why the party continues to perform dismally against Zanu-PF even when the economy is failing, to which Mafume said Zanu-PF employs vote buying tactics to win elections.

“You must understand elections language, retaining a seat is not winning it, that’s why I said take time to recover,” Mafume wrote on social media, Sunday.

He continued:

“How many times,the rural folk is captured, they have weaponised food aid, cyclone Idai assistance is being delivered in Zanu-PF trucks. There is no land tenure and there is command voting.”

Asked why his party continued participating if it felt the elections were always rigged in Zanu-PF’s favour, Mafume said:

“It is because we participated, that’s why the 2018 election was rendered illegitimate. How can a match be rendered unfair if it is not played? Let’s focus on righting the wrongs than focusing on the victim of the unfairness.”

In the by-election held in Chimanimani Ward 15 yesterday, the MDC polled 232 against 1 589 by Zanu-PF. That means the opposition party led by Chamisa polled just around 12% of the vote.