Indeed, the level of naiveté displayed by the MDC in engaging in these talks to the extent of being hoodwinked to vote in support of such evil legislation as Amendment 18, POSA, AIPPA and the partisan BSA (Broadcasting Services Act) is astounding to say the least.
It befuddles the mind to think that such “learned friends” as Welshman Ncube and Tendai Biti could be so easily fooled by the likes of Chinamasa and Goche to believe that Zanu (PF) would actually negotiate itself out of power. Even a thickheaded buffoon could easily see that the MDC was being taken for a nasty ride through the potholed Harare roads.
Now it is too late for the MDC to cry foul. With the willing help of the MDC, Zanu (PF) passed the senseless pieces of legislation that it needed to pass in order to convince the SADC that it was reforming the national law in order to level the political playing field.
The MDC cannot now withdraw its votes in support of those peripheral changes to the law of the land. The MDC is now stuck between a rock and a hard place. It faces the dilemma of participating in the forthcoming elections under the current undemocratic constitution and losing heavily to Zanu (PF), or boycotting the March elections and becoming politically irrelevant to the Zimbabwe crisis. Indeed, the MDC is running the risk of becoming a mere NGO. It might as well call itself the Mashonaland Development Centre (MDC).
Perhaps the only face saving act that the MDC can now resort to is to refuse to participate in the farcical March elections and embark on a nationwide campaign to mobilise the people of this country to boycott these elections. The people must be mobilised to refuse to go to the polls under the current constitution. The MDC can spearhead the people’s resistance to the dictator by staying at home on polling day. Let the 50,000 hoodlums that marched through Harare a few weeks ago be the only ones that will show up at the polls to vote for the tyrant and his party. The state’s coercive apparatus cannot force the people to go and vote.
They may actually force the people to go to the polls but they cannot make them vote. It is the right of the people to withhold their vote if they view the forthcoming elections as another attempt by the satanic oppressors to justify their repression of Zimbabweans and the ruination of our economy. There will be nothing to vote for this March under the current Lancaster House Constitution. Without a people-driven and democratic constitution, there must be no vote.
Zanu (PF) has perfected vote rigging into an art under the current constitution, and that is why the ruining party is petrified about a democratic constitution prior to the March elections. The MDC will be foolish to participate in these elections without the adoption of a democratic constitution for this country.
We all know that an MDC boycott of the March polls will not make Zanu (PF) postpone the elections to a later date. Rather, the dictator will quickly sponsor some of the usual NDA, NDE, NDUs to pose as opposition political parties that would like to wrest power from Zanu (PF). Fortunately, the people of this country will not be fooled by such actions, and they will reject both the demonic ruining party and its surrogates.
Post published in: Opinions