Free elections are "political suicide" for Mugabe vs rigged elections are social and economic suicide for the nation. by W Mukori

I agree with Patrick Guramatunhu, Mugabe has a nuclear arsenal with which to fight off Mai Mujuru and her PF if they should ever become a real serious political threat to the tyrant (Bulawayo 24 opinion). Mugabe has a warehouse full of detailed stories of acts of indiscretion, corruption and even murder on each one of Mai Mujuru and her PF friends; he will relish the chance to use the stink bombs to create chaos and confusion in the PF camp. 

 

Mugabe has out lived all of his political challengers; even with the country in a mess and old age catching up with him, he is still a formidable adversary because he has a secret weapon – he fights dirty. Whilst everyone else is constrained by such rules as no hitting below the belt; he go for the family jewels at the first chance he get be it with his head, fist, elbow, knee, foot, anything. His glove has a lump of steel for padding, he only has to land one blow anywhere and the opponent will feel the punch; land one on the head and its lights out!

 

What Mugabe will not want to do is give the game away that MDC’s demand for electoral law reforms will not deliver free and fair election or that PF will not stop him dead on his tracks from rigging the next elections. Throughout the five years of the GNU he worked hard to make sure Tsvangirai and his MDC friends never doubted for even a minute they would win the elections even with not even one GPA reform implemented. Mugabe would want to string MDC, PF and the whole nation along once again.

 

The regime has already started trial runs of the biometric system in which voters will be identified using their unique finger print and iris. The regime is already using this as proof if its acknowledgement that the old electoral system did not work well and the regime’s willingness to reform.

 

The biometric systems is called for in the new constitution and MDC will, no doubt, make a big song and dance about  this; they would give this as proof they are forcing Zanu PF “kicking and screaming” to reform, proof  NERA is working. All nonsense of course because MDC know that with no ZEC reforms, Zanu PF can rig the next elections just as easily as they did the July 2013 elections.

 

NIKUV, the Israeli company Mugabe hired to tamper with the voters roll in 2013, deliberately posted suspected opposition supporters details in the constituencies other than where they expected. So nearly one million voters (Mugabe’s winning margin was one million votes) failed to vote because their names were not in the constituent voters roll. NIKUV was paid a princely $10 million for doing this. No doubt they will do the same again with the biometric data for another princely fee!  

 

Many Zimbabweans are becoming increasingly uneasy with Tsvangirai and his reputation for making promises he cannot deliver. Many people were slowly coming round to the realization that MDC will never ever deliver free and fair elections; by now many of them would have been demanding the implementation of the GPA reforms as the only way to end this Zanu PF dictatorship. So the appearance PF on the political stage has been a blessing for Mugabe; instead of people demanding the GPA reforms they now believe Mai Mujuru will remove Mugabe from power even with no reforms implemented.

 

It is in Mugabe’s interest to encourage the belief that Mai Mujuru and PF are giving him sleepless nights and he is on the ropes. He does not want to implement the GPA reforms and he will do anything to ensure Mai Mujuru, PF and the public are not spooked into realizing the folly of going into yet another election with not even one GPA reform implemented.

 

If he manages to hang on, given the pressure he is under from the worsening economic meltdown and his own party imploding, without being forced to implement any GPA reforms then he has a fighting chance of winning the next elections.

 

If I was a betting man my money would be on Mugabe winning the next elections as long as no GPA reforms have been implemented regardless whom his political opponent happens to be, be it Tsvangirai, Mujuru or a grand coalition of the two with the plethora of all the other wannabe opposition parties. Mugabe will bamboozle Tsvangirai.

 

It is true that embedded Mai Mujuru sympathizers will make difficult for Zanu PF to rig the next elections but Mugabe will overwhelm PF with information; giving their incompetence, it will take PF forever to separate the good, the bad and the ugly. Meanwhile he will pick off the PF leaders one by one, bombarding them with the stink bombs from their dirty.  

 

The only sure way Zimbabwe can ever get out of the political and economic mess Mugabe has landed the nation is by implementing the GPA reforms followed by fresh free and fair elections. Vince Musewe is right it would “political suicide” for Mugabe because he will never win free and fair elections. Mugabe and his propaganda machine are working flat out to amplify the voices of those supporting Tsvangirai’s NERA and/or promoting Mai Mujuru as a real serious contender to defeat Mugabe in the next elections; they have to drown out the voices of reason warning of the folly of holding yet another election without implementing the GPA reforms.

 

Yes accepting free and fair elections would be “political suicide” for Mugabe but then another rigged election will be social, political and economic suicide for this nation. It is better that he  suffers the democratic consequences of regime change, he brought it on upon by imposing this de facto one-party dictatorship to gratify his insatiable greed for power and wealth; than the nation, the victims of his 36 am counting years of misrule, should continue to suffer and die in dumb anguish for even another day longer!