He has made messy choices that have left him with much egg on his face. In a desperate attempt to fill the gap left by Susan, his late wife, Tsvangirai hopped from one woman to another, leaving a trail of disastrous blunders.
The women with whom he has been involved have made startling revelations about him, especially as he raced to wed Elizabeth Macheka. They told of how he promised to marry them, how he actually married one of them, and how he made love to them without using protection, even in the absence of HIV tests.
His decisions and actions have attracted a lot of criticism from all quarters. People have rapped him for making bad choices about his lovers. They have accused him of failing to check the backgrounds of the women, some of whom have turned out to be plain gold diggers.
He has come under scrutiny for making rushed choices and being incapable of adequately appreciating the future ramifications of his actions. Perhaps most significantly, Tsvangirai, through his demonstrated weakness for women, has made himself vulnerable to the machinations of his rivals and enemies.
Now he has to live with a very unwelcome burden in the form of Locardia Karimatsenga, the woman for whom he paid lobola but later dumped—correctly so considering her shady connections with Zanu (PF) and the CIO. Legally, she is still his wife and there is a high likelihood that he will in the future share property with her in the event that they formally divorce.
To put it bluntly, Tsvangirai has shown a glaring lack of both cleverness and wisdom when dealing with his personal/bedroom life. But he can learn several lessons regarding his political career and his position as a national leader from the gaffes he has made.
First, he should realise that, as a statesman, there is great need for him to carefully choose his lieutenants and weigh their advice carefully. Unarguably, Tsvangirai, without absolving him, is a victim of the shenanigans of the people he trusted.
Given his status and position and the intricacies that come with his schedule, it is probably difficult for him to make direct choices of who he goes out with. Potential lovers are introduced to him by people – and in this regard we have seen too many cooks in the kitchen, among them party colleagues and pastors.
They have been falling over each to find a woman for him as a way of currying favour with the potential President of Zimbabwe. Actually, one cannot rule out the possibility of treachery and malice on the part of some of them.
Treacherous colleagues are not scarce. They laugh with you and mourn with you, but lead you down the wrong road if you do not give yourself time to reflect on them carefully.
Second, Tsvangirai should learn never to underestimate the power of a competitor or enemy. When he was bed-hopping, I am sure he never knew that his political enemies would mine his miscalculations and get capital out of them. As I write, his opponents in Zanu (PF) are having a party.
They are telling anyone who cares that Tsvangirai is not fit to rule because he cannot manage his love affairs. They are capitalising on all the errors he has made to tarnish his political image, and Locardia is a willing pawn because she has been spurned.
How embarrassing that, after having invited regional and other high profile dignitaries to his white wedding—which he naively believed would proceed smoothly—just a handful attended because of the controversy that surrounded the ceremony.
Certainly, Locadia’s successful application to have his marriage licence cancelled has battered his ratings in the eyes of his counterparts in southern Africa and beyond. Pius Ncube will agree with me that the last thing you want to do when you are competing against people in Zanu (PF) is to allow yourself to make silly mistakes. Ncube should have been smarter than sleeping around with that woman because, being such a fierce critic of Zanu (PF), he should have known that he was always being watched.
Third, Tsvangirai ought to realise that you cannot take people for granted. I would be the first person to admit that he has been insensitive and inconsiderate in his relationships with women. It is always unacceptable to have a one-night stand with a woman, make her pregnant and assume you can wish her away just like that. It is unacceptable to marry a woman and decide to dump her the following morning just because you have found another lover.
Equate the women with whom Tsvangirai has been involved with the citizenry of this country. Who would respect a leader who treats his people with disdain, fickleness and reckless? No-one, of course. So, much as Tsvangirai’s love life is supposed to be private, there is need for him to learn from it if he is to be a good statesman.
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Post published in: Opinions & Analysis