"Nothing short of free elections is acceptable," say Chamisa's new spin doctor - nonsense P Guramatunhu

Dr Nkululeko Sibanda is the MDC Alliance presidential candidate, Nelson Chamisa’s, new spokesman; taking over from Luke Tamborinyoka. He has only been in the post for one week and already Dr Sibanda, just like his predecessor before him, believes he has the silence to insult the good people of Zimbabwe by saying all manner of foolish things!

"The president is meeting with different people and will take action from their views. He is not taking action at the moment,” said Sibanda, according to Daily News.

"The president has made it very clear that nothing short of a free and fair election will be accepted by the people and ZEC must act in accordance with the law."

Zimbabwe is in this economic and political mess, with the national economy in total meltdown and stuck with a corrupt and tyrannical ruling party complete with its entourage of equally corrupt and incompetent opposition parties, because, for the last 38 years and counting, the nation has failed to hold free, fair and credible elections. Whilst it is no exaggeration that the people of Zimbabwe are desperate, they are dying, literally, for free, fair and credible elections; it is insulting to suggest that MDC leaders like Chamisa care that Zanu PF has rigged elections in the past and is set to rig this year’s elections too!

Just to refresh your memory Dr Sibanda, the people of Zimbabwe have risked life and limb to elect these MDC leaders into power on the understanding the party will bring about the democratic changes the nation needed to stop Zanu PF rigging elections. By far the best chances MDC has had to accomplish this goal were during the 2008 to 2013 GNU, all they had to do was implement the raft of democratic reforms everyone agreed were necessary for free, fair and credible elections. They failed to implement even one reform in five years!

With no reforms in place SADC leaders, who were the guarantor of the agreement that gave birth to the GNU, advised MDC leaders not to take party in the 2013 elections without first implementing the reforms. “If you go into next month’s elections,” SADC leaders warned Morgan Tsvangirai, Tendai Biti, Welshman Ncube and all the other MDC leaders, “you will lose; the elections are done!”

Tsvangirai et al did not listen and took part in the flawed elections; just as they had paid no heed to calls for them to implement the reforms during the GNU; and for the same reason too -greed. David Coltart, one of the MDC cabinet ministers during the GNU, readily admitted that boycotting the elections was the most sensible option but the party discarded it because greed got the better of them.

“The worst aspect for me about the failure to agree a coalition was that both MDCs couldn’t now do the obvious – withdraw from the elections,” explained Senator Coltart in his book The Struggle Continues 50 years of tyranny in Zimbabwe.

“The electoral process was so flawed, so illegal, that the only logical step was to withdraw, which would compel SADC to hold Zanu PF to account. But such was the distrust between the MDC-T and MDC-N that neither could withdraw for fear that the other would remain in the elections, winning seats and giving the process credibility.”

After the rigged 2013 elections MDC leaders seemed to come to their senses because they passed a party congress resolution that the party would not take part in future elections until the reforms are implemented. “No reform, no elections!” the nation was told. Sadly, as the date of the national elections approached greed crept in once again. Nelson Chamisa and his fellow MDC friends are participating in these elections knowing fully well that with no reforms in place Zanu PF will rig these elections just as blatantly as it rigged elections in the past.

Indeed, in their single-minded pursuit of the few seats Zanu PF has dangled to entice the opposition to take part in these flawed and illegal elections, MDC and the rest of the opposition opportunists have again and again undermined the efforts of those who have put Zanu PF leaders under renewed pressure to implement the reforms before these elections.

So, Dr Sibanda, we all know that Chamisa et al do not care that these elections are not going to be free, fair and credible, they have never cared before and are not going to do so now. What they care about is winning as many of these bait seats as possible and are only using the threat of boycotting the elections to pressure President Mnangagwa to take his heavy boot of the vote rigging juggernaut to give MDC a chance to win a few more bait seats.

The only other reason Chamisa and company want to keep the option to boycotting the elections right up to the voting day is as the bolt-hole. With no reform in place, no free public media, no verified voters’ roll, Zanu PF spending billions of dollars of looted national wealth to bankroll its vote rigging schemes, MDC losing all political credibility, etc., etc. it is becoming increasing difficult for the international election observers to pretend these are free, fair and credible elections. Before the elections are declared null and void MDC would play their boycotting the elections card in a last-ditch effort if not to claim the credit for triggering the nullification of the elections then to limit the damage to the party’s reputation for having participating in the flawed elections.

 Dr Nkululeko Sibanda, being Chamisa’s spokesman and spin-doctor, does not give you or anyone else the right to rewrite history to suit MDC’s selfish interest especial on the issue of free, fair and credible elections. The nation has had many golden opportunities to implement the democratic reforms designed to stop Zanu PF rigging elections and it is none other than MDC leaders who have wasted all these opportunities because they are corrupt and incompetent. You attempt to rewrite historic facts to give the impression Chamisa cares that there are free and fair elections is an insult to the nation the party has so blatantly betrayed!