Why MDCT/A and Mwonzora are heading to ‘Mbudzi’ political cemetery

The British left wing scholar activist Owen Jones in his seminal work “The Establishment ”, opined that ” Politicians are stripped naked and with no warning, shoved onto stage. The audience gasps: someone familiar stands before them, but now, under the unforgiving glare of the spotlights, the character is finally exposed for who it really is. Yet, as suddenly as the figure appears, it is covered up again and taken back to where it belongs: offstage”.

This is quite revelatory and instructive with the latest political reality check that confronted the Douglas Mwonzora led MDCT/A on the Saturday of the 12th of February 2022. Accordingly, politics is a game of numbers so goes the old age adage. That is, political supporters are the oxygen for any political organisation and also political votes act as the immune system of any political movement.

Therefore, in a malevolent and unforgiving testosterone and populist driven political environment such as ours, any politician or political organisation worth its salt, must possess this type of political oxygen and political immune system, in order for them to circumnavigate the politically and electorally slippery and suffocating valleys, mountains and the cliffs of Zimbabwe`s rugged political and electoral geography.

Thus, the sparsely and poorly attended Douglas Mwonzora`s inaugural political rally at Zororo grounds in the working class townships of Highfield where he was ostensibly launching his judicially and opportunistically constructed MDCT/A by-elections program, bring into sharp focus the question on the future or lack thereof of the MDCT/A.

Therefore, in this opinion piece, I will argue that the lukewarm and poorly attended MDCT/A rally is another latest harbinger signalling the inevitable demise of MDCT/A and Douglas Mwonzora`s political career. I will further spotlight why this unavoidable demise of the MDCT/A , had its genesis the moment Mwonzora, Thokozani Khupe and Morgan Komichi controversially assumed the leadership of the MDCT/A in March 2020.

The road to the political graveyard

The 31st of March 2020 will go down in political history as the beginning of the end of the MDC as a progressive political movement which was formed in 1999. Thus, it was on this fateful day that the Supreme Court decided to rewrite history and attempted to reconstruct a bridge on water which had already passed through treacherously and judicially constructed MDCT and weaponised and turbocharged it to politically cannibalise the then Nelson Chamisa`s led MDCA.

On that fateful day, Morgan Komichi accompanied by his other coconspirator Mwonzora, gleefully read a prepared victory speech and read a riot act to his erstwhile comrades in Chamisa`s led MDCA. Through the passage of time it later on transpired that the “victory speech” was nicodemously pre-written by Mwonzora on the eve of the Supreme Court judgement.

This clearly shows there was an unmistakable devious and underhand dirty tactic from the ZANU PF government, which had vested interests in the destruction of Chamisa`s led MDCA. Accordingly, the fact that Mwonzora and Komich knew the judicial outcome of the Supreme Court judgement, before its official announcement, was clear demonstrable evidence of the treacherous conduct of a compromised and captured Judiciary.

Once armed with the Mashavira`s Supreme Court judgement, Komichi and Mwonzora went on unrestrained political and parliamentary cannibalization of the Chamisa`s led MDCA, through vindictive and systematic Parliamentary recalls of both real and perceived sympathisers and supporters of Chamisa.

This callous and ruthless parliamentary recall was being ventriloquized as upholding and restoring the constitutional detects of the MDCT. Therefore the first significant roadsign on the Mwonzora`s MDCT/A onward journey towards the Mbudzi political cemetery was the MDCT`s shambolic and controversial ExtraBurial Congress of December 2020 which was euphemistically christened as the Extra-Ordinary Congress.

The ExtraBurial Congress was meant to address the constitutional issue red flagged in Mashavira`s Supreme Court judgement. However, it became an application of symptoms to the problems rather than a panacea to the problems. That is, despite being provided with unprecedented State largasee such as ZUPCO buses and the Rainbow amphitheatre, MDCT still failed to gather enough delegates to comprise the constitutional required quorum.

Suffice it to say that, the socalled Extraordinary Congress was plagued by mobocracy and blatant irregularities and serious allegations of electoral fraud and vote rigging levelled against Mwonzora.

Nonetheless, when Mwonzora controversially assumed the leadership of the MDCT, he ridiculously pitched his modus operandi under his self-doctrine of “rational disputation” which is quintessential politics of appeasement, co-option and ingratiating towards the ZANU PF regime which is clearly the antithesis of the MDC`s traditional oppositional politics of progressive adversarial combative holding to account and challenging the autocratic ZANU PF regime.

Consequently, under the stewardship of Mwonzora, MDCT never showed the political will nor the inclination to advocate for electoral contests, especially for the outstanding by-elections. The MDCT, through public utterances from Mwonzora and Komichi showed its willingness to short-circuit and subvert constitutional democracy through advocating for politics of co-option through dialogue, that will result in an elite pacting of Government of National Unity.

Furthermore, the MDCT became a willing tool in the tyrannisation and dismemberment of the national Constitution by ZANU PF by uncritically and naively endorsing and supporting the controversial para-illegal Constitutional amendments number 1 and number 2.

All the above clearly points out that Mwonzora, Komichi and the whole of MDCT, were just mere constitutionalists of convenience who promoted a warped, corrupted and self-serving doctrine of constitutionalism without constitutionalists.

The second significant roadsign on the road towards the Mbudzi political cemetery was when Thokozani Khupe, threw the political spanners in Mwonzora`s MDCT petty project.

On the 21st of January 2022, Khupe inevitably dropped a political bombshell, when she uncompromisingly declared, she had decided to split her MDCT faction from Mwonzora`s MDCT/A. This ultimately, socially and politically disadvantaged Mwonzora and his faction of the MDCT.

Consequently, Khupe socially and politically deprived Mwonzora, the little residual Matabeleland social and political base Khupe possessed. Khupe doubled down on this anti-Mwonzora crusade when the following day she launched the “beat the pot” campaign where she urged voters not to vote for either Mwonzora or ZANU PF in the forthcoming by-elections.

Accordingly, Mwonzora`s MDCT/A without the Matabeleland political lung will struggle to politically and socially breathe and function nationally.

The third important road sign on Mwonzora`s MDCT/A one way journey towards the Mbudzi political graveyard was one that took place on the Saturday of the 12th of February 2022. Thus, after the much delayed and long-overdue by-elections were declared to be held on the 26th of March 2022, most political parties activated their electoral campaigns.

Accordingly, the Mwonzora`s MDCT/A, despite never wanting to present itself in an electoral contest, was left with no other choice than to reluctantly drag itself into the contest. Therefore, on the 12th of February 2022 it officially launched its electoral campaign at Zororo ground in Highfield.

This was the much awaited first political rally of MDCT/A under Mwonzora by both neutral and concerned observers. This is because, since the controversial March 2020 Mashavira judgement, in which most judicial and parliamentary decisions went in blatant favour of Mwonzora and MDCT, Mwonzora supporters and handlers began to propagate a fallacious and delusional theory that Mwonzora is an adept, shrewd and strategic political operator, who had outmanoeuvred Chamisa.

However, seasoned political and legal critics and analysts such as Alex Magaisa were quick to point out that the credible litmus test to objectively assess the shrewdness of Mwonzora is in the uncaptured, neutral and independent theatres of the Supreme Court of Public Opinion. That is in the unforgiving opposition heartlands of the urban townships and its environs.

Therefore, on that rain soaked sunny Saturday it became a politically harsh reality check for Mwonzora and the MDCT/A. That is, it was a moment of truth whereby his self delusional bubble of being a strategic political operator was shattered and deflated.

The so called star rally which was meant to kick start the MDCT/A`s and Mwonzora by-election campaign as was anticipated was poorly attended. Instead of being a sea of red colours it became a patched and scattered small pools of red colours dotted around the open vastness of Zororo grounds.

The early optics, which came out of Zororo grounds were so depressing and pathetic such that the top MDCT/A leadership had to delay their attendance in the forlorn hope that people would magically come and attend their rally.

When Mwonzora finally arrived at Zororo grounds, he ridiculously tried to stroke his bruised ego by lying with a straight face that there are 5000 people in attendance yet the number of attendees was just under 350.

Even the State run newspaper such as the Sunday Mail, which had since March 2020 provided unprecedented favourable coverage to Mwonzora and the MDCT in an attempt to prop them up nonetheless objectively showed the video clip of sparsely attended MDCT/A rally and scorned it.

Furthermore, even the ZANU PF government itself have realised that they gambled terribly wrong by propping up Mwonzora in their authoritarian consolidation effort to neutralise and emasculate Chamisa.

This is buttressed by the recent Chris Mutsvangwa media utterances when he admitted that the MDC is politically dead. Ironically Zororo in our Shona cultural cosmology means a place of final rest and as such there is a cemetery named Zororo in Chitungwiza.

Therefore, the Zororo grounds where Mwonzora held his inaugural his ill fated and poorly attended rally, became a fitting metaphor for the enacting and staging of this third road sign towards the political burial of the MDCA.

The fourth road sign on Mwonzora and MDCT/A`s downward spiral towards political oblivion will be the 26th March 2022 by-elections. Thus, with each passing day it is becoming increasingly clear that the MDCT/A is heading towards an embarrassing electoral drubbing.

Accordingly, the past two years both Mwonzora and his new look MDCT/A have tragically failed to win the battle of hearts and minds within the opposition ecosystem.

Moreover, the emergence of the much loved Chamisa led Citizens Coalition for Change (CCC) on the political front has clearly made the position of MDCT/A politically and electrorally untenable. Thus, the forthcoming by-election will further push the MDCT/A and Mwonzora towards their political grave .

Needless to say, that the final road sign that will eventually lead to the reading of the political funeral rites and subsequent burial of the MDCT/A and Mwonzora into the Mbudzi political cemetery will be the 2023 General elections.

Thus, after the inevitable by-election drubbing, both Mwonzora and the MDCT/A will be pushed further towards the slippery cliff edge of political demise at the 2023 General election.

After the 2023 General election both the MDCT/A and Mwonzora will be consigned to the political scrap heaps and political dustbins thereby permanently occupying their places in the Mbudzi political graveyards, with their tombstones permanently engraved with their year of death as 2023.

In that Mbudzi political cemetery, the lifeless political corpse of the MDCT/A will join other political corpses such as the ZUM of the late Edgar Tekere, the United Parties of the late Abel Muzorewa and the ZUD of Margaret Dongo.

Ironically Mwonzora was an active political player when both the ZUM and the United Parties went into their political graves. Accordingly, it is this historical political affiliation of Mwonzora with Bishop Abel Muzorewa who is infamously renowned as the grandfather of politics of appeasement and puppetry that has earned him the moniker Mwonzorewa.

This shows that Mwonzora is ideologically and politically rooted in the politics of co option, puppetry and appeasement which is diametrically opposed to the radical, progressive, adversarial and combative politics of Morgan Tsvangirai, which have been now transplanted into and found a new home in the Citizens Coalition for Change. Therefore, the MDCT/A will be the third political party that Mwonzora has acted as its political undertaker.

When the future generations retrieve the MDCT/A death certificate, the cause of the political death will be written as the “tunnelled vision and myopic power hungry proclivities of Mwonzora ,Khupe and Komichi”.

Additionally, the epitaph on the political tombstone of the MDCT/A shall read “Betrayed by Mwonzora, Komichi and Khupe”.

Consequently Mwonzora, Khupe and Komichi will go down in history as the three political charlatans that lynched, killed and buried the MDC. Ultimately, their names will be engraved in the political roll of shame of political turncoats and charlatans such as Bishop Abel Muzorewa and Morris Nyathi who conspired to derail and subvert the democratic and freedom processes of Zimbabwe.