By Tichaona Sibanda
HARARE – The MDC-T has kicked off its door-to-door campaign in Harare, where it is targeting to recruit up to one million voters for this year’s make or break presidential and parliamentary elections.
Party spokesman for Harare province Senator Obert Gutu told SW Radio Africa on Monday the campaign that started on Saturday will cover all of the metropolitan’s 24 political constituencies.
The MDC-T holds 23 out of the 24 constituencies. Only the Harare South constituency was secured by ZANU PF’s Hubert Nyanhongo in the 2008 poll. Gutu said they’re working flat out to ensure ZANU PF does not win any seat in the province this time around.
“Our door-to-door campaign was jointly launched by Tendai Biti (secretary-general) and Nelson Chamisa (national organising secretary) two weeks ago at the Harare exhibition park,” Gutu said.
He continued: “So the campaign itself kicked off this weekend and from the feedback I got, it has been a resounding success. This door-to-door campaign is the most effective mass mobilisation and voter awareness exercise. For instance in Harare East, the campaign covered 2500 households in 24 hours and we will be doing this until election time,” Gutu said.
Metropolitan Harare is a stronghold of the Morgan Tsvangirai led MDC and has at least three million residents, by far the largest province in terms of population.
But turnout in past elections has been poor, forcing the MDC-T to devise new ways of exciting young and new voters. With a few months before Election Day, the MDC-T is spurring efforts to engage young and new voters even before the mobile voter registration exercise starts.
Gutu said they are using a combination of social media, personal contact and persuasion through door-to-door conversations to get young and new voters to show up at the polls.
“Young people have the biggest stake in this election,” Gutu said, adding: “If they don’t vote, their future will be in somebody else’s hands. If they vote, the future will be in their hands.”
As the party intensifies its quest for votes countrywide, the police have increased its crackdown on party officials.
Makoni South MP, Pishai Muchauraya has been ordered to report to the Harare Law and Order section of the CID on Tuesday, while Charlton Hwende, a senior official from Mashonaland West province has also been asked to report to the Chegutu police law and order on Tuesday.
Hwende wrote on his Facebook page that he is being summoned to the police for allegedly violating the draconian POSA legislation. Muchauraya, the party spokesman for Manicaland told SW Radio Africa police want to question him over the distribution of short wave radios in his constituency.
“Early this year I distributed radios to people in my constituency and that was my democratic right to do so because they were being starved of information in the rural constituency,” the Muchauraya said.
He added: “I didn’t break any law at all so I was quite surprised to receive a phone call from the police in Harare inviting me for questioning over the radios.” SW Radio Africa
