By Tino Chinyoka
In the polarized world of our politics, I fully expect that some will not even finish reading this piece before setting off to condemn the writer for ‘daring’ to advise ‘their’ leader and ‘their’ party, when I have previously made clear that after the debacle that was 31 July 2014, Tsvangirai ought to have left the MDC.
Indeed, I can even predict that some will say: why don’t you advise your own party, as if people are hermetically bound to this political association or that.
For a country that is so renowned for adapting, we are strangely static when it comes to our willingness to accept that support for political parties can change.
It is policy that should determine which party one supports, and if policies change tomorrow, or spectacular revelations of graft emerge, one should be able to withdraw their support and move on.
But, that is not the aim of this piece.
It is fair to say that this has not been a happy last few months for Morgan Tsvangirai. From the personal problems to the political problems, he has been prevented, at a time when President Robert Mugabe looked either dead or dying, from grabbing the initiative and appearing to be ready to rule.
A lot of what influences people to vote for a President is their perception that he is able to handle the demands of high office. So, when the incumbent goes missing, is rumoured dead, then appears at his sister’s wake in a seemingly half-dead stupor, you want to be seen as an alternative choice.
For Tsvangirai this should have been his hour, but then Elizabeth Macheka happened, and things, as they say, went downhill from there.
And that the damage has come from within is especially unfortunate. For it is not Zanu PF or women that have done it for Morgan this time round, but his very own people. Those that he counts upon as he calls his supporters, once more, to the breach.
Try as you might, if asked to think of who was most likely to put the knife into Tsvangirai, you would not have considered Eltom Mangoma, whose lasting image to my mind before this episode was that unfortunate photo of him under arrest about some fuel deal or other.
So, how has the Mangoma episode damaged him? It is too soon to tell. What is obvious though is that in the handling of that debacle, Morgan Tsvangirai has, yet again, not been best served by his advisors and his lieutenants. The reaction has been less than decisive. There was the silence the first few days, with supporters wondering whether or not the letter was authentic.
Then came the defence of Mangoma from youths baying for his blood. Then there were stories about Chamisa using unprintable words to advise Mangoma to go and represent fellow disabled people in Parliament, which did two things: confused those who had been whispering that Mangoma was merely voicing Chamisa’s thoughts, and also made you question the veracity of what we hear: Chamisa is a God fearing person who would never speak ill of the disabled.
So if that story was a lie, what about the rest? Then came rumours of a meeting, after which came news of a censure and a future disciplinary hearing, just as Luke Tamborinyoka (writing in his personal capacity no less, despite being so close to the action – I think spokespeople should never write in their personal capacities, but that’s another story), saying that leadership challenges were democratic and welcome. So, if they are welcome, and Mangoma clearly did not leak his own letter, why is be being disciplined again?
The whole picture was thus very confusing and confused. But, many took to the social media and chose to vent their anger at Mangoma. Those that did so did not see any irony in calling themselves democratic and yet advocating the stifling of debate in their party.
Instead of seeing Mangoma as the embodiment of their main message last election (President Mugabe has overstayed and must be shown a red card), they did not see in Mangoma’s letter the logical connection to their message: come 2018 Tsvangirai would have led the MDC for 19 years, and if he won the Presidency and got two terms, would have led the party for 29 years. President Mugabe has been president of Zimbabwe 33 years now. See the irony of that red card now?
At the same time, those that see merit in Mangoma’s letter need to ask themselves a simple question: why now?
After the debacle that was July 31, when many including myself were calling for Tsvangirai’s head, they all closed ranks around him and preached the gospel of a stolen election.
Now, I am passing no judgement on the veracity of that gospel, but I accept that the vast majority of the MDC membership and a large part of independent minded people buy the idea that Zanu PF rigged its way into victory.
Some of the ways in which it is claimed it happened are too fantastic to attract rational thought (the mysterious mutating ballots from China come to mind) but arguments around the manipulation of the voters roll, the busing of people from rural areas to peri-urban constituencies (my good friend Hwende made a very clear presentation about this on his Facebook page, which I thought plausible), the intimidation of election monitors at some polling stations, the strangely large totals announced as opposed to the numbers that were seen actually voting, all bear some reason for consideration.
However, the question is, if we said he was good enough them, why now? Why cripple the opposition by taking away the only legitimate face that is has had, as we were told? Tsvangirai, we were reminded in August, was the only acceptable face of the struggle. And these are not idle claims, it remains doubtful if anyone within the MDC leadership at present can inspire people at the grassroots as well as Morgan can.
Yes, Chamisa can deliver a good line of two, and is one for the future, but he is young, and in danger of taking his Christianity a bit too far. Tendai Biti is very intelligent, a possible shoe-in for Tsvangirai’s job, but comes across as too educated on the stump.
Mudzuri has not been known to wow anyone with any speeches, and Femai would probably alienate the entire female constituency. Below them, you are really scrapping the barrel. These are not my arguments, but what we were told when we advocated for leadership change in August 2013.
Now, every democracy needs a functioning opposition. The MDC brought into our country something we never had, a competitive political market. We now actually have a choice when we vote. We have two competing parties, with very different agendas, and a set of platforms that are distinct enough to present a choice. The nearest we get to participate in democracy is by choosing our representatives.
That is how we get to exercise power. Now, if the choices given to us are not competitive enough, we are in fact robbed of a chance to exercise our choice because the market is not functioning as it should. The people do not rule, they merely choose who is to rule them.
In other words, the purpose of making our democracy dependent upon competitive elections is not to guide the parties or government in the choice of policies, but to provide an incentive for the rulers not to become tyrannical.
So, we protect ourselves from the tyranny of our leaders by participating in free elections and choose the party least likely to tyrannise us. And they in turn treat us nicely because otherwise, unlike Arnold Schwazinegger, we will not be back. If we ask where the democratic element is in this theory, the answer is that it lies in the capacity of the people ‘to throw the rascals out’, as one author has put it.
Our democracy is thus, from this viewpoint, a mere method, one of several, but the one most suitable to protect our people from dangers of tyranny, at least in theory if not in practice. You will always have your Last Maengahamas and Madzores in a nascent democracy, especially when other factors militate against an actual change of government.
But, it is the ability to periodically change our leaders that protects us from tyranny, (at least theoretically), not the particular policies of the government itself: there is no nonsense about democracy as a vehicle for the improvement of our people that NGOs seek to sell – which I have always thought was them trying to hijack a good thing and use it as a mule for their development agenda.
‘The purpose of democracy is to register the desires of people as they are, not to contribute to what they might or might not with, to be. Democracy is simply a market mechanism: the voters are the consumers; the politicians the entrepreneurs … Politicians and voters are assumed to be rational maximizers, and to be operating in the conditions of free political competition, with the result that the market-like political system produced the optimum distribution of political energies and political goods. The democratic political market produced optimum equilibrium of inputs and outputs – of the energies and resources people would put into it and the rewards they would get out of it.’
For the Zimbabwe political market to work, the people need a strong MDC, to provide a competitive and plausible choice. Yes, that is not all they need, but it is part of the most important parts. Now, after the election in July, those in charge of the MDC decided that for the MDC to function, it needed Morgan Tsvangirai still. Yes, there are other players in the market who have made the political market uncompetitive, but that is not an excuse for the MDC to abandon its founding principles and start acting like some misguided free for all.
This is why the debate in the MDC at the moment seems so grubby and unseemly.
There seems to be a failure to appreciate the positive role that the MDC plays in our politics. (Whether or not one supports the MDC, this is basic fact.) There is no sense that the people realise their obligation to the people of Zimbabwe to shepherd the ship of viable opposition to the next election intact, so that through them, the people might make their choice.
Instead, intrigue rules. Letters meant for private consumption are leaked, there is silence from the people that should be coming forward to say that they are behind Tsvangirai (thus keeping their own supporters unsure what to think of Mangoma’s letter), and way too many people not are putting on their thinking hats. Tales of senior people attending meetings and keeping quiet do not help settle the waters.
But, assuming that there are two opinions, one for Tsvangirai to go as Mangoma proposes, and one for him to stay as his supporters think, it seems to me that the better course of action is neither. And I shall show why.
The message being sent out seems to be that it is okay to lose an election or two, or three or four or, even five, six or seven, but it not okay to lose your wife. Because, when you look at it objectively, what has happened between 31 July 2013 and January 2013, when Mangoma wrote his letter, to disqualify Tsvangirai from leadership?
Apart from having had his wife leave the matrimonial home, and he giving one or two ill-judged and ill-advised interviews, what happened? If you consider that the reasons being given by Mangoma existed on 31 July, apart from the one about the wife, then you can’t escape the obvious fact that it does appear that the view being taken is that precisely because of the interviews about matrimonial problems, he must go.
Now, when people pointed out all these reasons (less the one about the wife because it hand not happened), they were castigated as Zanu PF sympathizers. But why is it okay to point these things out now? Is it the fact of Elizabeth Macheka leaving home enough to change the facts so that the electoral defeat was because of the MDC and not some Israeli company?
So, if they thought that he was good enough on say 5 August 2013, bar Elizabeth Macheka, then the best thing to do it seems to me, to go and ask the people. Call a Congress, where the people, minus the hoodwinking from shadowy figures, and have Morgan put forth his entire leadership to test.
Morgan Tsvangirai needs to either burnish his credentials, or leave the party. I think we are past the realm of ‘let’s dismiss him’ or ‘let’s discipline him’. Nor are we still in the cloud cuckoo land inhabited by Luke Tamborinyoka and his recommendation for a leadership renewal debate with no end date in sight.
What Mangoma is saying is being said by rank and file members of the party. Something that needs to be addressed. Now. It would have been good to address it with a Tsvangirai resignation on August 1st, 2013, but since none happened, it would not make sense to resign now. That would only mean that it is happening because of Elizabeth Macheka.
Tsvangirai needs to be decisive. What he needs to say is that those that stand with me on one plate, and Mangoma and others on the other plate. Present the two teams to the special congress. This way, he achieves two things, he gets to know who is on his side and who is not, and avoids a situation where, as many now believe, some people close to him like, are briefing behind his back in the hope that when he falls they will step in.
By putting himself and them on a plate, he forces their hand. To decide where they stand. If they are with him, they will prevail with him. They cannot possibly tell their structures to vote them into political oblivion. And if they stand with Mangoma and win, then that is good too, the people will have spoken.
I hear legalists say that it is not in the constitution, that you cannot have block votes like that. But, it is also not in the constitution to seek to mount a coup against the party leader scarcely into his 5 year term by letter of dismissal on the basis that his wife has left him briefly, but there you are. Special rules can be agreed for a special congress.
Tino Chinyoka is a lawyer based in the UK
