By Patrick Guramatunhu- “POLAD’s biggest achievement is its mere existence as a platform where political leaders and parties from different backgrounds and persuasions are able to exchange ideas on how best to move the country forward. Political tolerance has already been born, it is now growing. It’s irreversible fruits will be felt with time,” Professor Lovemore Madhuku, one opposition leaders who joined Mnangagwa’s POLAD.
We must be clear where we are as a nation and then what we need to do to “move the country forward”.
Zimbabwe is in economic ruins; the economy has collapsed sending unemployment soaring to 90% plus, basic public services such as education and health care are barely functioning and 49% of the population is now living in extreme poverty. The economic situation is causing heartbreaking human suffering and it is socially and politically unsustainable.
Zimbabwe is facing the most serious existential threat in the nation’s history. The threat of the nation being thrown into social unrest and chaos comparable to what is happening in Libya or Syria is real and urgent.
The root cause of Zimbabwe’s dramatic economic meltdown is the four decades of gross mismanagement, rampant corruption and rank lawlessness earning the nation the pariah state status. And as long as the nation remains a pariah state ruled by corrupt, incompetent and murderous thugs who rig elections to extend their stay in office; there will be no meaningful economic recovery.
The A1 objective of the 2023 elections is to end the curse of rigged elections, pariah state and bad governance. And thus revive the economy, end the tragic human suffering and avert the pending social unrest.
Therefore anything that is helping to end the curse of rigged elections and pariah state will move the country forward. POLAD, by its nature and composition, is to justify the status quo and not to dismantle it.
Mnangagwa made it crystal clear, the number condition for joining POLAD was the acceptance of the July 2018 elections as having been free, fair and credible and of Mnangagwa and Zanu PF as the legitimate president and government. How anyone could ever accept Zimbabwe’s flawed and illegal elections as free and fair, beggars belief.
It comes as no surprise therefore that POLAD has not demanded, much less implemented, any meaningful democratic reforms to ensure the next elections are free, fair and credible. Madhuku and his fellow opposition politicians in POLAD and those like Chamisa and his MDC A who refused to join POLAD are all going to participate in the 2023 elections with no reforms in place. How that can ever be considered moving the nation forward is nonsensical.
We need free, fair and credible election process to get good and competent leaders. Corrupt and incompetent leaders would want flawed and illegal election process in which they invariably emerge as the winners. There is no disputing the fact that Zimbabwe’s elections are flawed and illegal.
“The electoral commission lacked full independence and appeared to not always act in an impartial manner. The final results as announced by the Electoral Commission contained numerous errors and lacked adequate traceability, transparency and verifiability. Finally, the restrictions on political freedoms, the excessive use of force by security forces and abuses of human rights in the post-election period undermined the corresponding positive aspects during the pre-election campaign. As such, many aspects of the 2018 elections in Zimbabwe failed to meet international standards,” stated the EU Observer Mission final report.
ZEC has repeatedly failed to produce something as basic as a verified voters’s roll, a legal and common sense requirement; for Pete’s sake!
The only rational reason why Zimbabwe’s opposition politicians have participated in the country’s flawed and illegal elections is greed. David Coltart, MDC A Treasurer General, admitted his book, The Struggle Continues 50 years of Tyranny in Zimbabwe.
“The worst aspect for me about the failure to agree a coalition was that both MDCs couldn’t now do the obvious – withdraw from the (2013) elections,” wrote Coltart.
“The electoral process was so flawed, so illegal, that the only logical step was to withdraw, which would compel SADC to hold Zanu PF to account. But such was the distrust between the MDC-T and MDC-N that neither could withdraw for fear that the other would remain in the elections, winning seats and giving the process credibility.”
Four of the main MDC factions plus three other opposition parties did form a coalition, the MDC A, just before the 2018 elections and yet they still went on to participate in the elections for the same reason as in 2013 – greed.
It should be noted that the opposition politicians knew that by participating in the flawed and illegal elections they were “giving the process credibility” and, by extension, giving the results legitimacy.
“To be sure, because of POLAD, the political environment under which the 2023 general elections will be held will be the best since independence in 1980,” continued Professor Madhuku.
It is no secret that Zanu PF will tone down its fiery rhetoric and restrain its violent operatives as long as the party is assured of electoral victory.
Indeed Zimbabwe is in this precarious economic and political situation of economic ruins, tragic human suffering and threatening social instability precisely because the nation has sort to appease Zanu PF’s insatiable greed for political power, wealth and influence.
Surely 2023 general elections must be about free, fair and credible elections and good governance and not about yet another rigged elections just to appease Zanu PF. It is not the survival of Zanu PF that is at issue here but the survival of Zimbabwe.