By Patrick Guramatunhu| “Our peace activists say each time an election date is announced, fear grips the communities.

This is not how things must be. Elections must bring joy to citizens that they now have an opportunity again to have their say in how the country is run. In Zimbabwe it brings fear because violence is assured,” stated a ZimRights report.

“Our politics is now an art of war. What political party you support determines if you are going to have access to food and participate in the economy, among other things.

“This state of war is the main reason citizens are withdrawing from public life and women are no longer interested in participating in politics. It has become a game of thuggery.

Without the nerve to violate other people’s rights, you can’t participate in our politics.”
The ZimRight report is aptly titled “Zimbabwe on the Brink: Living in Fragile Peace”.

Sadly, what the report failed to say is this is all self-inflicted. “Kurumwa nechokuchera!” as one would say in Shona!

Of course, we Zimbabweans are responsible for the economic and political mess we find ourselves stuck in.

The late Robert Mugabe and his Zanu PF thugs dragged us into this mess. 42 years of gross mismanagement, rampant corruption and rank lawlessness have left the country in economic ruins and a pariah state no one would want to do business with.

Now also late Morgan Tsvangirai and his MDC fiends had many golden opportunities, notably during the 2008 to 2013 GNU, to implement the democratic reforms which would have ended the Zanu PF dictatorship.

They have not only failed to implement even one token reform but to add insult to injury, they have been participating in these flawed and violent elections to give the Zanu PF regime legitimacy thus perpetuating the Zanu PF dictatorship.

And we, the people, have played our part in this tragedy in failing to stop the Zanu PF dictatorship juggernaut and failing to supervise the corrupt and incompetent MDC.

It is unforgivable that even now with the benefit of hindsight many Zimbabweans out there still have no clue the primary purpose of the GNU was to implement the democratic reforms much less that MDC leaders sold out by failing to implement even one reform.
Indeed, the reason why many Zimbabweans believe in Nelson Chamisa’s oxymoronic nonsense of “winning blatantly rigged elections” stems from their initial failure to recognise MDC leaders for the corrupt, incompetent and sell outs after the GNU.

It is a universally accepted rule of thumb, that nations get the government they deserve. We, in Zimbabwe, have certainly done nothing to deserve anything better than this corrupt, tyrannical and vote rigging Zanu PF dictatorship complete with the coterie, 130 at the last count, of corrupt and utterly useless opposition parties.

Zimbabwe is an independent nation and as of 18 April 1980, we are, per se, masters of our own destiny, masters of our own ship. We had the potential to become the “South Korea of Africa” as Japanese scholar and writer, Ken Yamamoto once noted.

We have become a quintessential failed state, a pariah state, with a filthy rich ruling elite riding roughshod over the filthy poor majority denying them a meaningful say in the governance of the country and even the right to life.

At the heart of Zimbabwe’s economic and political mess is the failure to hold free, fair and credible elections. Of course, Zanu PF does not have the right to rig elections it has blatantly rigged elections since 2013 only because MDC failed to implement the reforms and has participated in flawed elections to give Zanu PF legitimacy.

It is for the ordinary people of Zimbabwe to wake up to the political reality that MDC/CCC leaders are sell outs and stop following the party into this insanity of participating in flawed elections to give Zanu PF legitimacy.

Deny CCC political credibility and the party’s participation in the flawed elections will not give Zanu PF legitimacy.

We, the ordinary Zimbabwean, can neither stop Zanu PF going ahead with these flawed and violent 2023 elections nor can we stop Nelson Chamisa and his fiendish CCC participating out of selfish greed.

What we can do is deny CCC political credibility and deny Zanu PF political legitimacy.