When opposition cowards die many times before their deaths
NOTHING aptly summarises the Zimbabwean opposition more than William Shakespeare character Julius Caesar’s famous quote on death and cowards in the eponymous play, Julius Caesar.
Responding to his wife’s efforts to dissuade him from leaving home in the play’s Act II Scene 2 citing bad omens about his death, Caesar responded: “Cowards die many times before their deaths, (but) the valiant never taste of death but once.”
When The Standard weekly paper last week published a story based on an interview with CCC leader, Nelson Chamisa, where he threatened to boycott the 2023 elections, Caesar’s words readily came to the minds of many.
The usual refrain from the CCC’s trolls on social media when they wish to play the victim card to wring some funding from the usual gullible sources such as the American Embassy is that Zanu PF is running scared. The picture on the ground is, however, the total opposite.
If anyone is afraid of the 2023 poll, then it is Chamisa and his gang.
This is especially in view of the fact that he and his interim spokesperson, Fadzayi Mahere, spiritedly fended off efforts by some of his inner circle members who tried to knock some sense into him on the benefits of holding an inaugural elective congress to put in place leadership structures to undergird the political outfit’s 2023 campaign effort.
Chamisa cited possible infiltration by Zanu PF ahead of next year’s watershed elections. He was to expose his poor mettle as a politician early this month when he claimed that Zanu PF was bribing some senior CCC members to destabilise his political outfit.
If anyone is to blame for the current sorry state of affairs in his party, it is Chamisa himself. The claim means that his bid to protect the party from infiltration failed monumentally.
It exposed the fact that the claims of infiltration as an excuse to defer the congress were merely that — an excuse.
It is now coming out in the open that the infiltration issue was just meant to prevent the Biti faction from taking over the party using the congress.
The spectre of another deafening defeat from President Mnangagwa and Zanu PF is causing Chamisa sleepless nights.
This is especially in view of the fact that he fought against a better poll performance by strenuously fighting against a congress which would have given him a better electoral footing had he put in place some structures.
In view of this background, he is now looking for any excuse that he can latch onto, to explain away the defeat that awaits him next year.
Electoral reforms are the usual excuse that the opposition brandishes ahead of a major poll defeat. Chamisa learnt this at his predecessor, the late Morgan Tsvangirai’s feet.
Following the MDC-T’s defeat in 2013, Tsvangirai lost confidence in his party and his own leadership. This is why he began to champion the Without Reforms No Election (WRENE) mantra in 2015 which culminated in the National Electoral Reform Agenda (NERA) campaign involving other opposition parties in 2016.
Many will remember how some MDC-T and NERA youths protested ostensibly for electoral reforms on August 24 and 26, 2016 respectively.
The protests were characterised by mindless violence and vandalism in Harare which affected many innocent businesses in the capital city.
Tsvangirai earned the moniker Boycott for using boycotts as his default strategy on almost any issue.
Although he did not live to go through the 2018 elections, his party went on to participate in the polls under a new name, the MDC Alliance after realising that President Mnangagwa and Zanu PF would never lose sleep over a cry baby opposition.
Similarly, if Chamisa is still in charge of CCC by the time the presidential election nomination court sits for next year’s polls, he will be forced by his party to contest. In any case, Mahere has been consistently telling the world that her party is not boycotting the elections.
It is interesting to note that both Chamisa and Tsvangirai waited until it was too late to push for electoral reforms. The opposition was in Parliament and Government between 2009 and 2013, but Tsvangirai and his colleagues, Chamisa included, opted to use the time to sip tea and enjoy the trappings of being in Government.
They forgot to use the correct platform for legislation — Parliament — to push for the reforms they desired.
The fact that nearly a decade later, Chamisa is using the same excuse buttresses the opposition’s use of electoral reforms more as a reason to explain its failure than a genuine electoral grievance.
Chamisa’s legislators have earned themselves infamy for heckling President Mnangagwa in Parliament instead of using the platform to suggest policies that can improve society’s well-being.
For over a decade, opposition legislators have failed to push for the reforms they desire opting, instead, to pursue them at wrong forums such as rallies and the social media.
The scared Chamisa also cited the need for what he termed a “credible voters roll” as another reason to boycott next year’s polls.
Chamisa and his team do not know anything about voter registration, the voters roll and the administration of elections. They have been pontificating loud and long mostly on social media about irregularities in the voters roll not from their own expertise or experience, but from the claims made by a group of United States-sponsored alleged hackers known as Team Pachedu.
What they conveniently forget is that the voters’ roll is a security document that contains people’s private details. It is a fluid document and an ongoing work in progress where new registrants’ names are added and dead voters’ details removed.
When NewZimbabwe.com ran a story this week which was headlined “Chamisa in cross hairs, lieutenants losing faith and not confident of 2023 win” the background of Chamisa’s threats became clear.
This is because he is not only facing a Zanu PF with a solid delivery track record next year, but he is also surrounded by people whose trust in his ability to win against the ruling party is fast and irretrievably running out.
Chamisa’s failure to put in place a sound strategy to compete against Zanu PF, as well as his dictatorial tendencies, which have seen him concentrate power in himself and his Kitchen Cabinet comprising Mahere and her deputy, Gift “Ostallos” Siziba, are some of his lieutenants’ main concerns.
Despite the online noise about the much-hyped Mugwazo rural mobilisation programme, Zimbabwe’s rural constituencies remain a political impregnable fortress for the tactless opposition and Chamisa’s inner circle is very worried.
This is worsened by the opposition’s failure to deliver basic services in the urban constituencies which it has been winning since 2000.
Senior CCC members are not happy with Chamisa’s hostile response to criticism and advice.
One example that stands out like a sore thumb is his recent appointment of former Zimbabwe National Students Union (ZINASU) leader, Takudzwa Ngadziore as the party’s new youth leader without consulting his interim executive.
This irked people like interim secretary general Chalton Hwende.
Sadly, most of the senior CCC members are afraid of confronting him over these issues for fear of reprisals.
Criticising invites labels such as Zanu PF infiltrator and ostracisation.
According to the story, so desperate and bad is the situation in the CCC camp that the names of one of Chamisa’s deputies, Tendai Biti and Crisis Coalition in Zimbabwe (CiZC) chairperson, Peter Mutasa, are being bandied about as possible replacement for the out-of-depth opposition leader ahead of next year’s elections.
The first lines of William Butler Yeats’ poem, The second coming: “Turning and turning in the widening gyre/The falcon cannot hear the falconer/Things fall apart, the centre cannot hold” resonate very well with Chamisa and his party’s situation.
Like Tsvangirai before him, Chamisa (if he will still be in charge of the party) and the CCC will participate in next year’s polls and receive the defeat that awaits them. NewZimbabwe.com’s story and Chamisa’s threats provide a sneak peek into the turmoil in the opposition camp and how much of a waste of votes it will be for the electorate to vote for him and the opposition next year.
Given that the CCC lacks time and the requisite resources to reverse its unenviable situation in view of the limited time left before the 2023 polls, the party is electorally doomed and it is not too late for some of its members to move over to Zanu PF.