""Regional balance will make MDC stronger" - nonsense, it is damaged beyond fixing P Guramatunhu

“Hupenzi inyama yegakava!” (There is no one more stubborn than an idiot!) we say in Shona. Hopewell Chinono is not just a run-of-the-mill idiot but one paid and paid well to confuse the opposition and the Zimbabwean people at large. Whilst the nation is fighting hard to end the weakness that have dragged us into the hell-on-earth we are now stuck in; Chinono is doing his idiotic best to keep us there!

Zimbabwe is in a serious economic and political mess after 39 years of corrupt, incompetent and tyrannical Zanu PF misrule. There have been many, many golden opportunities to end the de facto one-party Zanu PF dictatorship but sadly they have all been wasted because the opposition tasked to implement the democratic reforms were corrupt, incompetent and sell-outs.

There is one common denominator is both the ruling party and the opposition, both camps are stuffed to the rafters full of corrupt and incompetent individuals! There reason for this is easy to see, there is no meaningful debate and democratic competition allowed in the parties.

When Robert Mugabe, for example, succeeded Ndabaningi Sithole in 1975 as leader of Zanu PF there was no debate or democratic elections; he was nominated, seconded and crowned. Mugabe then surrounded himself with dimwits like the late Simon Muzenda, Joice Mujuru, Emmerson Mnangagwa, etc. whom he promoted under the pretext regional, gender or some such feeble excuse.

With dimwit around him it was then easy for him to justify his refusal to groom a successor – there was no suitable candidate. Come each elective congress, he saw to it that only his name was in the hat turning the election into a coronation.

It is an open secret that Mugabe was a control freak; he never allowed his ministers any slack to do anything in case their accomplishment eclipses his own. In all his 37 years as head of government, Mugabe has never allowed a cabinet meeting to go ahead unless he is there to chair it. No doubt many of the intellectuals appointed into his cabinet or some such position have learnt to tone down their contribution just to their job. By the time they final left, Mugabe had reduced many a professor and otherwise well respected professional into idiotic savant.

The dimwits around Mugabe have done the same thing themselves. Aware of their own serious, they too have in turn appointed dimwits who will not be a threat to their own position.

There is no meaningful debate or democratic competition in most of the country’s opposition parties. They are all copies the Zanu PF template. Nelson Chamisa succeeded Morgan Tsvangirai in can only best described a palace coup and he is now consolidating his position as leader using the same undemocratic means Mugabe would be proud of. And guess who is cheering and applauding MDC blundering; Hopewell Chinono.  

“I had a chat yesterday with a friend emanating from the article I had written about the upcoming MDC Congress and Nelson Chamisa’s imminent official ascendancy to the MDC Presidency, after being nominated without opposition,” wrote Chinono in one of his articles in Nehanda Radio.

“In my view they can emerge much stronger from this congress if there is a true representation of the country’s regions in the top six positions.”

This culture of turning elections into coronation is counter-productive because it stifles debate and democratic competition. Chamisa should have been asked to defend his performance record to date and present his vision of what he wants to do in the future. A serious challenger to Chamisa was then expected to cross examine the record and take Chamisa to task on everything. Chamisa will be forced to defend himself and cross examine the challenger’s record. It is this cut and thrust that forces quality leaders to emerge and to keep them on their toes.

Leaders should be elected on merit and merit alone. The moment you compromise on merit to allow for regional, gender, race, etc. you have lost it because you open that bottle for whatever reason there is no closing it!

Hopewell Chinono is a Mnangagwa apologist masquerading as an opposition adviser. The opposition parties in Zimbabwe have been corrupt and incompetent and hence the reason they have failed to force Zanu PF out of power regardless of its pathetic track record. Chinono’s job is to make sure the opposition parties continue those practices guaranteed to keep corrupt and incompetent individuals as leaders so opposition parties remain weak and feeble.

“The MDC should avoid the retrogressive temptation to elect their number 1 and 2 positions from the same region, and they should also not try to appease folks close to their President in return for proximity to the main center of power,” argued Chinono.

Neither Mugabe nor Mnangagwa had their number 1 and 2 from the same region and that did not stop their respective regimes being corrupt, incompetent and utterly useless. In the case of MDC, the damage has already been done by turning this elective congress into yet another meaningless rubber stamping coronation.

There is nothing to shout about Chamisa’s past performance record; he is corrupt and incompetent and will now surround himself with dimwits who will not be a threat to his leadership. MDC A will continue to be led by corrupt and incompetent individuals for the next five years, nothing has changed there.

There is no progress but Chinono is paid to misled the MDC leaders and members into believing the party is strong and set to win 2023 elections hands down!