Rank hypocrisy in MDC senate debate

Rank hypocrisy in MDC senate debate

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• MDC to boycott senate - Tsvangirai

By Msekiwa Makwanya

THE Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) now seem to be a party where everyone seems to be expelling everyone, violating the party constitution, and a party where everyone is following the party principles.

All this depends on which side of the highly contentious senate issue you are coming from. Without confluence of thought or intellectual coherence, it is interesting to see who is more “MDC than the other.”

While every party has procedures of handling matters, in the current MDC people claiming to be guided by the MDC principles as they tell us, have become the complainants, prosecutors, and judges of their own cases. We have not heard of any disciplinary hearing yet as stipulated by the party constitution but some senior MDC members have already pronounced the verdict that certain members no longer belong to the party. Just like that.

Anyone with whatever they call authority should use their authority to have matters resolved though the stipulated party disciplinary procedures because failure to do so would be a disgusting abuse of authority.

The most unfortunate development in the dispute involving the MDC’s participation is the tacit approval of violence against those who want to participate within certain quarters of the MDC structures.

The boycott advocates have not issued a statement against violence of any sort but they have been content to say that they make campaigns in their area impossible. Paul Themba Nyathi has had to call the police to come out in full force to protect those who want to carry on their political campaigns. Violence has been reported and it is not the magnitude of violence that is an issue here but the mere possibility that some MDC members have chosen the deadly path against their own is self defeating.

On violence, I am mindful that it could be verbal or physical but we need to know whether you could be violent (at least against other members for whatever reason) and remain a member of the MDC.

Like all the time whenever there is violence, leaders (if they are still in charge) are always called upon to speak against violence of any form. A wise leader realises that opening fights on many fronts is not wise unless you have the resources to see it through. It is enough to boycott, if you feel that is how you wish to express yourself but it is another matter to cause distress or physical harm to anyone participating because that is no longer a boycott, it is direct participation.

By intimidating or interfering with other people’s campaigns you are actually influencing the outcome and the claim that you boycotted is rendered meaningless. In other words everyone could be participating.

If it is true that some MDC candidates are simply participating so that they can earn some income as senators while Zimbabweans are suffering, then why not leave the voters to decide and embarrass them? If you then go and campaign against them it means you are not even sure about what people think and you are desperate not to be proved wrong. In any case if these people are no longer MDC as we hear now, then why intimidate them when they are no longer your members. Why not let them stand as independent candidates and get them disqualified by the courts if at all they will win?

I can hear a voices saying, “But the courts are all full of Zanu PF judges”. Would it not be ironical that the party President Morgan Tsvangirai still has a 2002 Presidential election dispute case against President Robert Mugabe in court so can he refuse to take other cases to the same courts? It is like boycotting the senate but remain in parliament, you are part of the same system.

In the final analysis, either people boycott or they participate and the moment they interfere with those participating it ceases to be a boycott. If you have expelled people from the party, you do not have to follow them and threaten them, they are out. Even if they come into “your” province and participate as is being said they become independent candidates. It is like divorcing a wife and you do not wish to see her move in with the man next door. The problem is that we know that that those who participating have not been expelled and the reality of them participating is a pain for those in the anti-participation. In the meantime we wait for the constitutional body to address the matter of who has been expelled from the MDC and many have already made themselves subject of disciplinary hearing by utterances and actions.

Some people somewhere are no longer supporting their party but individuals. They claim they have “no agendas or interests” and one wonders whether they know where they are going. They purport to be speaking for the people of Zimbabwe which could be an attempt to bite more than what they chew because if ever anyone chooses to speak for the people of Zimbabwe he or she should reflect their divergent views without victimising them. Those who want peace will find it. In democracy you count heads you do not break them.

Msekiwa Makwanya is a social commentator based in England. Contact Makwanya: makwanya@yahoo.com
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