Zimbabwe: Seven telltale signs from Bikita West by-election

By Phillan Zamchiya (PhD, Oxford)

What a sad Sunday for democracy in Zimbabwe. The Zimbabwe Electoral Commission (ZEC) confirmed that President Robert Mugabe’s ruling Zimbabwe African National Union Patriotic Front (ZANU PF) has floored the opposition in the Bikita West by-election which was held on 21 January 2017 in southern Masvingo Province.

ZANU PF scored 13 156 votes (77.9%), Joice Mujuru’s Zimbabwe People First (ZimPF) had 2 453 votes (14.5%). Innocent Muzvimbira came a distant third with 725 votes, Madock Chivasa of the National Constitutional Assembly (NCA) had 343 votes, Terrence Makomborero of Progressive Democrats of Zimbabwe managed 132 votes with Heya Shoko, an independent, getting a paltry 76 votes.

ZANU PF won despite the relative collapse of the formal economy, worsening crises of livelihoods and deepening fissures in the top echelons of the ruling elite. Are there any indicative lessons that can be drawn from Bikita West despite it being a single case study?

I posit seven for now.

First, politicized tribalisation as a mode of rule in the rural areas, with its genealogy in the colonial state, remains a thorn in the flesh of electoral democracy. This is one of the dilemmas that the opposition faced collectively in the just ended Bikita West by-election.

With the power embedded in traditional and partisan-political authority, traditional leaders campaigned openly for ZANU PF. Even the paramount chief of Bikita, Mr Mazungunye, was chanting ZANU PF slogans at a rally where Beauty Chabaya was unveiled as candidate by Vice-President Emmerson Mnangagwa on 4 January 2017.

Chief Murozva also ordered 39 village heads to campaign for ZANU PF and assist voters. The traditional leaders using politicized customary power also helped to distribute farming inputs and food aid in the run up to the election. 

On the voting day, they marshaled what Mamdani would call ‘subjects’ and not ‘citizens’ to the polling stations and assisted them to vote.

Public resistance was difficult because the real power of traditional leaders in Bikita West is located in their day-to day practices of allocating communal land, demarcating boundaries, and accepting or expelling members from the community. These processes are nested within a system of political partisan administration to suit the interests of the ZANU PF ruling elite in the same way it suited the colonial administration of the past.

The opposition in 2018 risks being confined to waging a democratic campaign in the urban areas with limited penetration of the rural sector. Without democratization of partisan rural customary power, formation of preferences in an election remains limited for the rural folks.

Even if the opposition had managed to navigate this web resembling the classic ‘decentralized despotism’ the Member of Parliament would still not be able to govern effectively. The Executive would still dominate governance through an intact web of village heads, headmen and chiefs that would sideline the elected as happened in many rural areas where the Movement for Democratic Change won previously. Yet a massive rural campaign is still a top priority in the next 18 months.

Second, the use of prebends to gain votes in a complicated mesh of patronage still inhibits electoral choice. In Bikita West, it was not the distribution of the farming inputs that was problematic but who, how and why it was distributed. One had to belong to the ruling party to easily gain access to the state sourced resources.

Redistribution of farming inputs did not follow the defined policy criterion to expand production as in the government’s newly launched command agriculture. Beneficiaries were not assessed according to their capacity to produce surplus as electoral politics took centre stage in Bikita.

ZANU PF used the farming inputs as a source of patronage to create and reward its clients and exclude opponents as a way to mobilise electoral support.

For example, Dzidzai Maregere of the NCA was denied farming inputs at Bikita business centre on 31 December 2016. Exclusion was carefully thought out, for example, Joice Mujuru had a rally on 19 January 2017 at Nyika Growth point and government decided to distribute farming inputs on the same day. To attend Mujuru’s rally was to automatically exclude self and confine family to hunger for a full season.

Prior to the allocation of the farming inputs ZANU PF slogans were chanted with fists punching in the air, ‘Pamberi ne ZANU PF!’ (Forward with ZANU PF!). Examples include ZANU PF chairman, Phillip Dhliwayo, at a food distribution gathering on 23 December 2016 and Jeppy Jabon at Murwira primary school at a fertilizer distribution meeting on 30 December 2016.

The so called command agriculture is designed as a two year program so that it overlaps with the 2018 general elections. Rather it is a command vote program. It is not about production, for it has never worked in Zimbabwe, it is about reactivating patron-client relations embedded in agriculture where the rural majority makes a living with an eye on 2018. This is what Bikita West reinforced.

Dismantling this patronage system in the rural area before 2018 is a tall order. However, massive political education and shrewd strategies can help. For example, the late Zambian President, Michael Sata, coined a brilliant ‘Don’t Kubeba’ (Don’t Tell) strategy in 2011 elections. This was within the context of the ruling Movement for Multi-Party Democracy (MMD) dishing out patronage goods. The genius in the logic was to let citizens receive the goods but not tell they were going to vote for Sata. This is trumping someone’s democratic right to freely express but it works in anocratic states such as Zimbabwe.

Third, the harvest of fear strategy, designed for 2013 general elections after the violent June 2008 Presidential farce election, is now a norm rather than an exception. The lesson here is that, ZANU PF would still prefer to win the general election through subtle forms of intimidation that are less visible therefore less cost.

Shuvai Mahofa, the Masvingo Provincial Affairs Minister, openly threatened the electorate at Gwindingwi High School on 4 January 2017. She said, ‘Bikita West is not a constituency for fun politics. There are some who disappeared in 2008 because of politics and we all know that. So let us go and vote properly’.

Naked violence is not the preferred mode after the political consequences of June 2008 terror campaign. I am inclined to share Simpser’s view that ‘as a first approach to the choice of tactics of manipulation, one can think of the supply curve of manipulation, according to which the means of manipulation that yield the greatest benefits at the lowest cost will be chosen first’. This is why naked violence was lower than in the early 2000 Bikita West by-election before June 2008 turned the tide.

However, the attempted assassination of Madock Chivasa, the NCA’s spokesperson, a man who is brave by nature and by an act of political will, by gun wielding men on January 17 2017 at Nyika growth point shows that naked violence remains a live option on the table.

It can be employed within a split of a second depending on the threat. Other victims of violence included ZimPF members who were beaten on 11 December 2016 at Hozvi business center as reported by Heal Zimbabwe Trust (HZT).

Be that as it may, the case of Chivasa, showed that naked violence will undermine the legitimacy of the regime. The photos of a battered Chivasa, with a broken arm and bandaged head circulated via social media resulting in rebuke from the international community. For example, the European Union produced a bold statement castigating such barbaric acts and the United Kingdom (UK) ambassador to Zimbabwe Catriona Laing also condemned the act.

Our point remains that in 2018 ZANU PF will not hold a liberal democratic election that completes the chain of democratic choice. Consequently, seasoned organisations such as the Zimbabwe Peace Project and CSU must be resourced enough to work on early warning mechanisms and be on high alert as 2018 approaches.

Fourth, each opposition political party needs to grow a distinct social support base for the efficacy of the envisaged pre-electoral coalition or just to increase its national relevance. The danger is for all to rely and share a static and traditional opposition political base.

The combined number acquired by the opposition parties that participated in Bikita West was 3 729 (22.1%) votes against ZANU PF’s 13 156 (77.9%) votes. This means even if they had formed a coalition they were likely to be defeated.

Fifth, and linked to the point above, Zimbabwe cannot afford to wish Morgan Richard Tsvangirai out of the electoral equation at this historic juncture. His party’s non-participation in the by-elections was always going to make it easier for ZANU PF to entrench its hegemonic rule not only in Bikita West though the reasons for reform are understandable.

With real or imagined flaws, Tsvangirai remains the most popular opposition leader in Zimbabwe today, as even testified by recent MPOI surveys. He has an in-born gravitas and stamina to galvanize the electorate and his heart beats with the masses. It is a herculean task given Zimbabwe’s political terrain to create another Tsvangirai before 2018.

Maybe his presence at the Joice Mujuru campaign rally in Bikita West could have increased the competition. There was deflation of interest from some voters in Bikita when Tsvangirai’s office announced he was not going to attend due to a clash of political programs.

I do not believe it was a clash of programs, as my brother Obert Gutu, the MDC T’s spokesperson, would like me to believe. It was mere shrewd political calculation to reinforce to any doubting Thomas that Tsvangirai is the ‘real deal’. It was a bit of altruism though, after all Tsvangirai had the political vigor to beat a Mugabe-Mujuru alliance in 2008 so that point is known.

The results from Bikita West clearly indicate that Mujuru will do better than Simba Makoni’s 8% in 2008. Mujuru’s party had 2 453 votes (14.5%) in this by-election compared to MDC T’s 3 863 votes (21.9%) in 2013. A marked difference of 7.4% in favour of the MDC T.

If the ZANU PF vote remains static in Bikita West, it means that the opposition parties that took part, if they combine, will need to gain new 9 427 votes + 1 vote in 2018 to wrestle the seat. That is not a walk in the park. What if Mujuru and Tsvangirai decide to do a twosome and we make a wild assertion that Mujuru’s recent vote is distinct from Tsvangirai’s 2013 vote and combine the two? The two will still have a deficit of 6 840 votes to meet ZANU PF’s 13 156 votes. So the two will need to mobilize 6 840 + 1 vote in the 11 wards of Bikita West in the next 18 months assuming ZANU PF’s vote will not grow.

Consequently, Tsvangirai and Mujuru need to strategically broaden the coalition or to mobilize and register new voters and there is nothing wrong with doing both given the electoral threshold in Zimbabwe is as high as 50% + 1 vote to be State President.

As 2018 approaches, how one of Zimbabwe’s battle-hardened politicians, Tsvangirai, will position his party and interests visa-vis the growing inter-party cry to retire President Mugabe will be important. Uniting his party and building inclusive alliances not only for the numbers, but for de-securitization, democratisation, de-politicization and de-escalating violence in the rural sector will be critical in unlocking and harvesting the rural vote. Some of such partners might be located in ZANU PF.

Sixth, civil society remains an important axis of Zimbabwe’s democratisation project. In Bikita West, the triumvirate alliance of the tech savvy Elections Resource Centre (ERC), the organically structured ZimRights and the needle-eyed Heal Zimbabwe Trust (HZT) complemented by the unparalleled experience of the Zimbabwe Elections Support Network (ZESN) and the regional boomerang voice of Crisis in Zimbabwe Coalition was key.

These and other CBOs ensured monitoring of the process, free flow of information and their presence in the ‘war zone’ increased the cost of ZANU PF engaging in more visible and naked brutality. Increasing the network density of the CSOs in Bikita West could have resulted in more impact but most CSOs are virtually under resourced.

As 2018 approaches, CSOs need to partner think-tanks such as the Zimbabwe Democracy Institute (ZDI), MPOI et cetera for more systematic pre-electoral surveys and parallel voter tabulation (PVT). Others that can link with the diplomatic community like SAPES are also important. Bikita West showed that orphaning CSOs as in depriving them of basic resources will leave a huge democratic deficit in 2018 which the state will happily capitalise on.

Finally, Bikita West shows that ZANU PF continues to behave like a troop of baboons. They fight internally but when faced with external threats they regroup. The ruling elites have the capacity to close ranks when an outsider wants to grab the morsel of power on their lips. They prefer to fight from inside the state rather than from outside for they know very well that it is very cold out there.

Members from all walks of factions attended the star rallies addressed by Mnangagwa and Phelekezela Mphoko on the 4th and 18th of January respectively. The ruling party secretary for production, Josiah Hungwe, a known Mnangagwa supporter was present at Mphoko’s rally on January 18 2017.

Even though his body language betrayed his disdain for Mphoko, he remained glued and focused to harvest votes. Power bound them together. MPs from as far as Manicaland and Mashonaland attended, such as Lawrence Katsiru and Joseph Chinotimba to beef up support for the party.

Of importance is that, the disgruntled voices of the expelled and leaders of the war veterans might not have much impact on causing deviation of votes (bhora musango) with the rural masses in 2018.

As Sadomba has argued elsewhere, the relationship between ZANU PF and war veterans has always ‘involved complicity as well as contradictions, alliances as well as antagonisms, authority as well as subordination’.

In my view, the relationship is uneven because the ZANU PF national leadership has access to coercive state apparatus, patronage crumbs and mediums to churn ideological rhetoric and will strategically use such to silence and control a number of the war veterans. It is therefore better to plan for a troop of baboons when dealing with ZANU PF.

On that point, that is it for now.