Financial Gazette (Harare)
Mavis Makuni
28 February 2008
opinion
Harare — As campaigning for next month's elections has picked up pace so has the explosion of rhetoric as candidates work over time to win the hearts and minds of voters.
But some candidates, especially those representing the ruling party, which has been pitching the same message for 28 years, need to know the limits to which they can exploit the human attribute of curiosity and zest for exploration. They should be aware that even the finest symphony, if repeated often enough, becomes banal and common place. They must be reminded that after being re-read continually, even the best novel cannot continue to be gripping.
One campaigner who is definitely not striking the right chord is the ZANU PF candidate for Mguza, Obert Mpofu, who is also the Minister of Industry and International Trade. Mpofu's campaigning got off to a disastrous start when he likened the Mguza constituency to his bedroom and warned that challenging him in the polls would be like trespassing into his boudoir. The Minister's unfortunate bedroom analogy is pregnant with potentially self-damaging innuendo and I cannot resist asking whether he metaphorically or otherwise regards his constituents as his "wives," to borrow a characterisation first broached by Margaret Dongo to describe the bootlicking and sycophancy surrounding the First Secretary of ZANU-PF, President Robert Mugabe.
After his bedroom gaffe, which reminds voters of the politicians' habit of personalising national issues and regarding the country as their personal fiefdom, Mpofu was reported by a Sunday paper to have raised his rhetoric by several octaves last weekend when he directed his vitriol towards presidential candidates Simba Makoni, who broke ranks with the ruling party, and Morgan Tsvangirai of the Movement for Democratic Change (MDC). Mpofu is apparently angry with the former politburo member and finance minister for no reason other than the fact that he has the nerve to exercise his democratic right to aspire to and seek election to the highest office in the land. Mpofu attacked Makoni for challenging President Robert Mugabe, saying,"We had people like Makoni, but he got carried away. It is surprising how he still calls himself ZANU-PF because he knows how dominant the party is. We know all independent candidates are backing him."
The minister talks as though vying for the presidency and seeking election as an independent is a crime. He forgets that there can be no such crime in a supposed democracy as Zimbabwe was touted to be by the powers-that-be.
However, Mpofu's utterances give a true insight into how such issues are viewed within the ruling party. The fact that a member of that party can become such cannon fodder for the public media merely because he sees things differently and believes he is entitled to have a go at trying to pull this country from the abyss, makes one appreciate ZANU-PF's intolerance for divergent views more fully. It is the more reason why things must change.
At the same campaign rally at which he slammed Makoni for challenging President Mugabe, Mpofu also latched on to a favourite target, the MDC. Two of the four candidates challenging him for the Mguza seat are from the two factions of the MDC. Mpofu attacked them for not knowing what it takes to be leaders, saying this meant knowing the day-to-day needs of the people. This implies ZANU-PF still knows the meaning of leadership and why it is in power. Ha, ha.
Mpofu and other ruling party candidates hoping to rest on ZANU-PF's historical laurels should know that in the untenable situation prevailing in the country today that will simply not work. The people have suffered and struggled long enough and want answers, not institutional platitudes. Long-suffering Zimbabweans want to know specifically how and when the myriad problems and crises that have robbed them of normalcy and dignity in their day to day lives are to be tackled and they know this cannot be done by harking back to the past and casting opposition parties and groups as scapegoats.
This is exactly what happened when another ruling party candidate, Information and Publicity Minister Sikhanyiso Ndlovu who is vying for the Pelandaba-Mpopoma seat, launched his campaign in Bulawayo last weekend. The guest speaker at the event, Bulawayo Metropolitan province Resident Minister, Cain Mathema urged the people to vote for the ruling party in next month's polls because the MDC had failed to deliver and had made false promises.
After enduring the suffering and indignities of the last decade, voters will know it is fallacious to blame the MDC for the government's failures which are all-pervading and not just evident in Bulawayo alone. What promises can an opposition party break when it is not responsible for formulating and implementing national policies? Mathema cannot fool anyone by suggesting that the MDC is responsible for the electricity and water shortages and other problems being experienced in the city when the same problems have not been addressed even in urban centres where government-imposed commissions are running the show.
Instead of trying to pass the buck, ruling party candidates should come clean and tell the people of Bulawayo and Matabeleland in general once and for all why the government has dragged its feet for the last 28 years with regard to the implementation of a project to draw water from the Zambezi river. As if this dereliction of duty was not bad enough, the government has reneged on pledges to build a pipeline linking Mtshabezi dam to Bulawayo's water supply system. How can the opposition be blamed for this deliberate and cruel neglect?
Instead of blaming opposition parties, Mathema should explain why the "people's government" has not come up with a viable plan to alleviate Bulawayo's water woes if it cares about the plight of the residents. The only aspect the government has been actively pursuing is its high-handed and undemocratic attempt to impose the inept and discredited Zimbabwe National Water Authority (ZINWA) to take over functions formerly efficiently executed by the local authority. Mathema must not forget that before ZANU PF interference and harassment, Bulawayo was the best run municipality in the country.
Unless they have very short memories, voters in Bulawayo will recall how not long ago Water Resources and Development Minister, Tinacho Mutezo, suggested that water from the decommissioned and heavily polluted Khami dam should be reclaimed for human consumption. Mathema cannot claim that sanctions, which are now a very tired mantra, are to blame for the government's failure to take care of the needs and welfare of its people.
In case he has forgotten, Mathema must be reminded that the sanctions, which are targeted at particular individuals in the ruling party and government, have not stopped these individuals from enriching themselves beyond their wildest dreams at the same time as the rest of the populace can neither afford nor access basic commodities, the health and education sectors have collapsed, unemployment and poverty are rampant and the cost of living escalates by the minute.
The people have listened to enough mantras and conspiracy theories with regard to all these problems. What is now needed is a government that cares enough to address these issues honestly for the benefit of all Zimbabweans instead of one bent on maintaining the status quo to give the ruling elites an unfair and undeserved advantage.
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