Dabengwa running scared

EDITOR - ZAPU leader, Dr Dumiso Dabengwa is a very, very scared man. Recently, the politician claimed at a Press conference in Bulawayo that the Zimbabwe Elections Commission (ZEC) was incapable of holding credible elections next year.

Dr Dabengwa went on to suggest that the 2018 elections should therefore be postponed.

His major reason for calling for the postponement was that ZEC did not have the requisite funding to create a new voters’ roll and, according to him, this would force the electoral body to resort to using the 2013 voters roll which he claimed was anomalous in that it allegedly contained names of ghost voters.

Dr Dabengwa, however, did not produce any evidence to back his claims.

The opposition leader claimed that his party wanted “Zimbabweans to be aware that the voters’ roll that will be used in the 2018 is the one that was used in 2013 that already brought fraudulent and unfair results”.

The opposition politician should know that the fact that election results are not in one’s favour does not mean the elections were not free and fair.

A look at Dr Dabengwa’s utterances indicates that the basis for calling off the 2018 election is not incompetence on the part of ZEC in discharging its mandate. It is based on speculation that Government may not have the resources to fund the biometric voter registration (BVR) which ZEC is set to roll out.

Instead of confining himself to his role as an opposition leader, Dr Dabengwa sought to play both the Minister of Finance and Economic Development, who has the responsibility to fund ZEC, and the opposition.

Elections are run and funded by governments through electoral bodies such as ZEC and not by some failed politicians.

Only a failed politician running an opposition party, which is devoid of meaningful programmes to offer the electorate, would be afraid of an election.

The position of opposition leaders in the electoral scheme of things is to sell their policies, programmes and projects to the electorate and not to spend sleepless nights on how ZEC is going to run the next election.

ZEC is very competent in discharging its duties. The 2013 harmonised elections which it ran were certified by both the African Union (AU) and the Southern African Development Community (Sadc) as free and fair.

As has become the norm with Zimbabwean opposition parties, Dr Dabengwa also uttered that “State security organs must stay away from the planning and running of the country’s polls” without giving evidence of his claims.

ZEC is currently holding countless consultative meetings with Zimbabwean opposition parties which have never complained of any member of the security forces attending such meetings. These claims have been bandied about for a long time and it is time that the opposition backs its claims with evidence or shut up.

The claims have become the scapegoat for failed politicians who think that they are entitled to win elections without lifting so much as a finger in working towards earning the electorate’s support.

Dr Dabengwa suggested that an “independent management body” should take over the running of elections from ZEC if it refuses to defer the plebiscite.

Dr Dabengwa served in Government before leaving ZANU-PF in 2008 to form ZAPU.

He is expected to appreciate that ZEC is a constitutional body which opposition parties should not seek to influence, direct or dictate terms to. It is in place by the national charter and not by the whim of an inconsequential political party.

ZAPU has no meaningful support to win sizeable seats in Parliament, let alone land the Presidency of the country.

This is frustrating the party and it is resultantly throwing political tantrums of frustration.

Recently the party was back in the media this time claiming that Government was frustrating development in the Matabeleland Region.

This marginalisation narrative is now so overmilked and tired that no one would take anyone using it seriously. Dr Dabengwa and ZAPU are a frustrated and desperate lot who are clutching at straws, including broken ones, for political survival.

If Dr Dabengwa was to be taken as a serious politician he should endeavour to win the electorate by pointing at his party’s own achievements and track record instead of creating non-existent shortcomings on the part of Government as a campaign message.

It would seem that the 21 years that he spent in ZANU-PF went to waste as he did not learn anything on how the party wins elections through working hard to address the electorate’s needs.

Nobleman Runyanga