18 NGOs, Demand ‘No Threats To Anybody Reforms Before Political Reforms

“As a democracy, we need to grow and the electoral reforms that we are proposing are not a threat to anybody,” said Tawanda Chimhini.
“These are recommendations that will open up space for all political actors to get involved in elections, for Zimbabweans to actually fully participate in elections.”It is when one hears this kind of nonsensical talk that one sighs in despair. Our people have been denied this basic and fundamental right to free, fair and credible elections and again and again after years of working hard to corner this hare it has been those supposedly hunting with the people who have allowed it to escape.

“One-man-one-vote!” was the rallying cry before independence yet it was none other than hearing President Mugabe and his Zanu PF who have since then denied the people the meaning vote. The new rallying cry is “One-man-one-vote, only if that vote is for Zanu PF!” in the name of no regime change.

No regime change has served President Mugabe and his Zanu PF cronies very well; they have enjoyed 35 years and counting of absolute dictatorial powers and unfettered access to the nation’s resources and wealth. It is the populous who have suffered.
With no one to hold them to account President Mugabe and his cronies have completely destroyed the nation’s economy as mismanagement and corruption grow and spread. President Mugabe has had to resort to brutal political repression and even murder to impose the Zanu PF dictatorship and subdue the restless masses. Millions of Zimbabweans are living in poverty with millions more having left the country as political and/or economic refugees.

So all the fight to end white colonial exploitation and discrimination going back a century and more that culminated with independence in 1980 failed to deliver and guarantee all our people the freedoms and rights including the right to a meaning vote and the right to life. It was President Mugabe and his Zanu PF cronies, our liberation war heroes and heroines no less, who connived for selfish political gain to deny the people their basic freedoms and rights.

So the struggle for freedom and human rights and dignity continued. The struggle continues! La lute continue!

In 2008 the struggle reached a new epoch; after one of the most violent elections in the nation’s history, President Mugabe and his Zanu PF thugs were forced to sign the 2008 Global Political Agreement (GPA) with a raft of democratic reforms to be implemented which were designed to dismantle the Zanu PF dictatorship brick by brick and to build a democratic system in its place.

This time it was Morgan Tsvangirai and his MDC friends, who were elected on a ticket to deliver democratic changes, who betrayed the people by failing to implement even one of the reforms in their five years in the GNU. Not one.

Mugabe bribed Tsvangirai et al to kick the reforms into the tall grass and the MDC leaders took the bribes. Of course MDC leaders “sold-out” as Thomas Mapfumo has rightly said on Nehanda Radio a few months ago.

So in 2008, just as happened in 1980, those the people thought were fighting in their corner are the ones who ended up stabbing them in the back. La lutte continue!

Just how long can this nation continue with this “La lutte continue!” “The struggle continues!”
18th April 1980 should have marked the end of our struggle for freedom and human rights. It did not but only because the people were betrayed. Similarly 31st July 2013 should have marked the day when all Zimbabweans cast the very first vote in a free, fair and credible elections and had all their other rights and freedoms delivered and guaranteed. So is the next epoch going to finally deliver the free and democratic vote and all the other rights and freedoms? Or will it result in yet another call to implement reforms or realign laws with the constitution?

I sigh in despair because if the nation listens to misguided people like Chimhini we will be back to “La lutte continue!” guaranteed.
Chimhini is not just some Joe Block, he is the director of Election Resource Centre (ERC) and ERC and 17 other local organisation petition parliament against “piecemeal” electoral reforms. The reforms ERC are calling for will NOT deliver free, fair and credible elections and all the other rights and freedoms we have been fighting for all our lives. Chimhini admits as much himself.

The democratic reforms proposed 2008 GPA were a serious threat to Mugabe and Zanu PF because they were designed to dismantle the dictatorship and end the party’s no regime change nonsense. The electoral reforms ERC are calling for (MDC – T has called for the same reforms too) are “not a threat to anybody”, as Tawanda Chimhini has readily admitted himself.

So we are not implementing the 2008 GPA reforms which would have finally delivered and guaranteed the freedoms and democratic and human rights of all Zimbabweans in favour of the watered down electoral law reforms to appease Mugabe and his Zanu PF friends. No wonder we have we are still fighting for the same freedoms and rights we should have secure 35 years ago and are still nowhere securing them!

It is what is politically convenient to Mugabe that is at issue here. It is the need to finally deliver and guarantee the freedoms and democratic and human rights of all Zimbabweans who have been cheated and denied these rights all their lives; that is what is at issue here. We must implement all the democratic reforms in 2008 GPA; that is not negotiable!
By – Wilbert Mukori