Con-Court burying vote rigging evidence is not in povo's interest P Guramatunhu

Before independence it was common to hear of a white farmer beating up his black worker, tie him up with a rope and drag him around in his vehicle. The worker would die of his injuries. The court would fail to convict the white farmer of any crime “for lack of evidence”. The Police would have seen to it that the poor worker was buried complete with all the incriminating evidence, no post-mortem report, no witnesses, etc. The Judges would make heavy weather of the lack of evidence, although they could have easily demanded that the body to be exhumed, etc. They were playing their assigned role to perfection.

Some things have changed in independence Zimbabwe others have not changed. Instead of the white colonial oppressors we got the Zanu PF ruling elite instead. The game of those in positions of power and authority committing serious crimes and the State Institutions rallying to hide the evidence and pervert the course of justice has continued and the victims of the injustice – the powerless and voiceless black majority - too have not change.

What took place in our Con-Court on 25 August 2018 is nothing short of an re-enactment of the white farm vs black worker during the days of Ian Smith or be it the victim of the injustice was all the millions of ordinary Zimbabweans who continued to be denied their right to a free, fair and credible vote!

Let me say it up front, loud and clear as a church bell rung in the quite morning; the 2018 Zimbabwe elections were rigged.

“If the elections were rigged, then produce the evidence. MDC Alliance leader, Nelson Chamisa, challenged the election results claiming the elections were rigged but failed to produce the evidence in the Con-Court!” President Mnangagwa and his Zanu PF supporters and apologist will argue.

Nelson Chamisa and his fellow opposition friends were advised on the futility of contesting these elections without first making sure the democratic reforms necessary to stop Zanu PF rigging the election. Sadly they paid no heed to the warning. It was insane to go into these elections without something as basic as a clean and verified voters’ roll. Insane! And yet this is exactly what happened.

There were glaring irregularities such as ZEC’s failure to produce a clean and verified voters’ roll, the ballots cast in the presidential race exceeding those in the parliamentary race (the law stipulates that ZEC must keep a record of voters who take one ballot but not the other – which they did not), voting patterns that would suggest multiple voting, etc.

The Con-Court judges acknowledged the irregularities but would not take the sworn evidence of the applicant, ZEC, etc. as permissible because there was no collaborating evidence from the sealed ballot boxes. Chamisa never requested the sealed ballot boxes to be opened and so all the other evidence was of no consequence.

“The best evidence in this instance would have been the contents of the ballot box themselves; that is the primary source evidence. Evidence of the contents of the ballot boxes compared to the announcements by the electoral commission, and the evidence within the applicant’s own knowledge, would have given the court a clear picture of any electoral malpractices, if any had occurred,” argued Con-Court Chief Justice Luke Malaba in his judgement.

“No such proof was adduced by the applicant to support his allegations. The electoral law is designed to protect the vote. The protection of the ballot cast by every single citizen who participated in the election is fundamental.

“It is the one that the court should guard jealously.”

What nonsense. This is the equivalent of the Judge in the white farmer case refusing to exhume the murdered work out of respect of the dead. Surely the dead will be served best by the truth being uncovered and justice served.

How is Con-Court protecting the citizen’s right to free, fair and credible elections by aiding and abating those denying the people that right by making sure the evidence of vote rigging remain buried!

“In terms of section 93 subsection 4 sub-paragraph (a) of the Constitution, Emmerson Dambudzo Mnangagwa is duly declared the winner of Presidential elections held on the 30th of July 2018,” concluded Chief Justice Malaba.

Justice Malaba, it is the interests of the ruling elite and not the common man and woman that you and your fellow Con-Court judges are guarding jealously! Zanu PF blatantly rigged last month’s elections and justice was not served by making sure the conclusive evidence of vote rigging was buried.

Thucydides' "something is not quite fair" with elections - is no licence to rigging P Guramatunhu

One of the things that has helped to drag us into the economic and political mess we are in as a nation is our failure to distinguish the wood from the trees, the trivial from the important, lies and wishful thinking from facts and reality. The situation is made a hell-lot worse when there is no freedom of expression and freed media. The individual is bombarded, day and night, with lies and propaganda for the purpose of complete brainwash the citizenry; lies and wishful thinking become the new facts and reality. It is little wonder Zimbabwe is a mess!

"In a democracy, someone who fails to get elected to office can always console himself with the thought that there was something not quite fair about it," remarked Thucydides, a respected Athenian historian and army general,” wrote Gibson Nyikadzino. 

“In any election, the minority are always a victim of the democratic process. This is the way democracies really work and Zimbabwe is no exception to that in reality. Those that deny the existence of a democracy, aptly put, losers, are often forgetful that there is no second place in politics, hence when they face defeat, they blame the electoral process using Thucydides' words that "there was something not quite fair about it".”

What Nyikadzino has failed to grasp here is that Zimbabwe’s election was not a democratic process. How can this be a free, fair and credible elections when there was no free public media so the electorate had an opportunity to study for themselves what each of the candidate stood for? 2 to 3 million potential voters were denied the vote because they were in the diaspora. ZEC failed to produce a clean and verified voters’ roll so only the authorities know how many of the 4.5 million cast ballots were from real voters whilst the rest were ghost voters.  

Zanu PF has been rigging elections ever since the country gain her independence in 1980. It is a history fact that Zanu PF did not withdraw all its freedom fighters as agreed in the Lancaster House agreement for the sole purpose of intimidating the electorate and its political opponents, for example. So the 1980 election was more about stopping the civil war, Zanu PF had warned that if the party lost the war would continue, than electing leaders freely.  

“Thucydides' view is proof in an opposition context that Mr Nelson Chamisa has for a long time been exhibiting. The losing MDC-Alliance presidential candidate has denied everything democratic in Zimbabwe,” continue Nyikadzino.

“The continued rejection of presidential results, the denial of the Constitutional Court ruling and his blind eye to the reality that the progressives are moving ahead are signals to his evaporating "legacy". When people embrace change, they ought to be careful and diligent about the decisions they make, because the political path is highly spiked with thorns.”

Poor Nyikadzino, he is trying hard to give his nonsensical diatribe credibility by clothing it in a democratic cloak! No amount of distortions and lies will ever turn Mnangagwa’s corrupt, tyrannical Zimbabwe, a pariah state, into Thucydides free and democratic Greece. The two nations are poles apart.

There was order, freedom and rule of law in Thucydides’ Greece and the Athenians paid meticulous attention to detail. This was the golden age of Greece! In Zimbabwe chaos rules the roost, we have failed to benefit from the 2 500 years of human development and progress that separate us from the ancient Greeks. Thucydides was a wise and just man unlike the buffoons and thugs ruling in Zimbabwe today.  

The blunder Nelson Chamisa made was to agree to participate in these elections with no democratic reforms in place. “MDC has stringent measures to stop Zanu PF rigging the elections!” he claimed.

It is now self-evident Chamisa was lying as Zanu PF has blatantly rigged these election. MDC leaders are their golden chances to implement the democratic reforms during the GNU; they failed to get even one reform implemented in five years because the sold-out.

It is therefore not a matter of consoling oneself that "there was something not quite fair about” Zimbabwe’s elections. We know the elections were rigged, the evidence is there, a mountain of it. And to ignore the evidence and the facts is down-right foolish!

Detail matters! Detail is everything!

Only a dim-wit like Gibson Nyikadzino, masquerading as an intellectual, would confuse chaos for order, tyranny for democracy, a rigged election for a free and fair elections. Thucydides was a wise and just man unlike the corrupt, vote rigging thug Mnangagwa; one cannot compare the two, the latter is not even fit to untie Thucydides’ sandals – he will steal them!

"ED is Mugabe mark 2!" - skunk is out, UK wants it doused with GNU, Chanel 5 perfume W Mukori

There are certain events which, on their own would not even be noticed, assume ginormous significance because of the circumstance under which they take place. The last straw that broke the camel’s back!

In Hans Christian Andresen’s fable The Emperor’s New Clothes it was the little child that cried out, "But he isn't wearing anything at all!" who forced everyone to admit what everyone knew was true but too foolish to admit. After nearly a month of avoiding to give their finally verdict on Zimbabwe’s recent elections, it took the British MP, Kate Hoey, to spell out what everyone else had witnessed but did not want to be the first to say it. She did not mince her words, the elections were NOT free, fair and credible.  

“Without doubt the election has been cleverly rigged but even worse is the fact that it is the military that is behind the regime and they are now unleashing a similar fear and terror campaign on leading opposition activists and curbing all protests by killing and arresting innocent Zimbabweans,” she wrote in her article in Zimeye.

“The courage and self-sacrifice of the Zimbabwean people is humbling to behold. We, in the international community cannot accept the result of the election and the UK government must take a lead to ensure that the Zimbabwean government is seen for what it is a mark 2 Mugabe regime and one that deserves no support whatsoever.”

The elections were rigged, Mnangagwa is Mugabe mark 2 and the international community must not support his regime. The genie is out of the bottle and there is no putting it back.

“Despite the denials in the officialdom, the European Union (EU) and the British government seem to be succeeding in mellowing protagonists in the Zimbabwe crisis and nudging them towards some form of a unity government,” reported Bulawayo 24.

“The international media first leaked reports of the talks mid this month, which were later corroborated by the Daily News.

“The EU and the UK, it would appear, want President Emmerson Mnangagwa's government to officially recognise the MDC Alliance - Zimbabwe's main opposition party - in exchange for international recognition, which is critical in unlocking economic aid and access to financial institutions such as the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund.

“As part of the arrangement, this could see Zimbabwe adopting the British parliamentary system, where the leader of the opposition and his chief whip are paid by the State.”

If this is indeed true then this is nothing more than EU and UK conspiring to administer sugar coating pill to the long suffering people of Zimbabwe.

If these western nations accept that the elections were rigged then they must accept that this Mnangagwa regime, “Mugabe mark 2”, as MP Hoey rightly called it, is corrupt, incompetent and tyrannical and all it cares about is retaining absolute power at all cost, as it has just proven by rigging the elections. The addition of the equally corrupt and incompetent MDC leaders to the regime will change nothing.

Zanu PF and MDC leaders worked together before in the 2008 to 2013 GNU. They tasked to implement a raft of democratic reforms designed to stop the blatant vote rigging and wanton violence the nation was subjected to in 2008. After five years they failed to get even one reform implemented. It is naïve to believe the same protagonist will do any better.

If there is no guarantee that the 2023 will not be blatantly rigged as happened this year; then, what is the purpose of this GNU other than securing ministerial limos and fancy job titles for MDC leaders.

President Mnangagwa promised to hold free, fair and credible elections this year. He was told that he needed to implement the democratic reforms agreed at the onset of the last GNU, but he refused to do so. He failed to deliver free and fair elections.

After 38 years of rigged elections and the nation is serious economic and political trouble, Zimbabwe must face up to this problem of rigged elections and act decisively. Mugabe mark 2 must be told in no uncertain terms that he must step aside and allow the nation to appoint others who can be trusted to implement the democratic reforms and finally get the nation out of this hell hole.

A Zanu PF and MDC GNU is NOT a sugar coated placebo! We already know the politicians from both sides of the political divide are not interested in implementing any democratic reforms. They failed to get even one reform implemented in five years of the 2008 GNU.

A Zanu PF and MDC GNU is NOT a sugar coated painkiller! The international investor know that Zanu PF rigged these elections and will remain the dominant partner in this fudged political marriage of convenience. They know Zanu PF will rig the next elections just as readily as they rigged this year’s elections. Zimbabwe is a pariah state and no investors want to do business with thugs.

A Zanu PF and MDC GNU is certain NOT a sugar coated cure! The presence of Chamisa and a few MDC leaders not transform the Zanu PF dictatorship into a competent and democratic anything!

So the Zanu PF and MDC GNU the EU and UK are proposing is nothing more than a sugar coated sedative! The West would want the ordinary Zimbabweans to believe the GNU will solve the nation’s problems of bad governance and make them suffer in silence. The GNU will serve the West the blushes of  having to deal with the vote rigging Zanu PF without being seen as done something to tame the thugs; the GNU will be dousing the Zanu PF skunk with Chanel 5 perfume – it kill the stench, at least for a short while!