Kae Matundu-Tjiparuro
11 April 2008
opinion
THE Zimbabwean Electoral Commission (ZEC)'s delay in announcing results of the presidential poll does not help the Zimbabwean situation in any way. In fact the longer the delay the more the view becomes credible that Zanu-PF is just buying time to cook the results.
Yes, ZEC might be waiting for the right time to announce the presidential poll results given the fluidity of the situation in that country. However, further delay could have opposite unintended from the presumed good intentions of ZEC. By holding back the results, ZEC so to speak, is holding the Zimbabwean people in suspense thereby compounding their suffering. That's not all but by procrastinating the announcement of the results ZEC is not helping the governance vacuum that is steadily crippling in.
For the last two decades or so the Zimbabwean people wherever they find themselves have been suffering and continue to suffer. Internally, they have been at the sharper end of an economy with an inflation rate in excess of an unprecedented 100000 percent. Life, if reports coming from this country, once a beacon of hope for the sub-continent, are anything to go by, has been for the ordinary Zimbabwean a living hell to say the least. Equally for those who hoped to escape the situation in their native land by seeking refuge in neighbouring countries, life has not been a bed of roses.
At last through the recent polls Zimbabweans seem to have spoken for a new beginning. Despite, this is a beginning Zanu-PF seems hell-bent on seeing coming to fruition only to save its own skin and that of its bigwigs who seem to have been riding on the suffering of the Zimbabwean masses. Not that they have a better option. As the last couple of years have proven and demonstrated, Zanu-PF is no longer in a position to positively determine the affairs of Zimbabweans in a way that its people can regain their dignity and the country restores its former glory.
There is no denying that it is an uphill struggle to reconstruct the economy of this once powerful African country. Certainly, the jury seems to be out on Zanu-PF telling by its own doing the last few years and the pitiful state to which it has relegated, demoted and retrogressed the country. Yes, the Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) may not have the necessary liberation credentials as Zanu-PF. It may also be granted that the MDC is as yet untested in terms of running the Stately affairs of the country. However, there is one simple thing that Zanu-PF would ignore to the peril of this country. That is that the people seem to have spoken.
The Zimbabwean people, I am sure, are ever grateful for the role of His Excellency Robert Mugabe, firstly, for his contribution to the liberation of this country and secondly, by shepherding the country to prosperity the first few years of liberation. However, somewhere along the road Mugabe seems to have reached a level of stagnation if not retrogression. If he continues on this path that he has been treading lately, his track record as one of Southern Africa's foremost freedom fighters and formidable statesmen and women, runs the risk of erosion if not already eroded and obliterated.
Thus the honourable thing to do is for Mugabe to preserve the last honour and dignity that the Zimbabwean people, the sub-continent and continent still has for him and to gracefully step down and for the results of the polls to take their course.
Yes, Mugabe and company liberated Zimbabwe from colonialism. That epoch has come and gone. We are now in an epoch where the Zimbabwean people are looking for new liberators. Such liberators obviously are not Zanu-PF and the current crop of its leadership. The presidential poll results may not be out yet but there is no doubt that in they eyes of the long-suffering Zimbabwean masses, Morgan Tsvangirai is their new liberator.
Yes, in Mugabe's eyes, Tsvangirai may be a puppet of some kind. If one can give the President the benefit of the doubt on his views, one must equally respect the view of the people albeit for their seeming ignorance about the puppet factor. Puppet or not, the hard reality is that Tsvangirai seems to be the one the Zimbabwean people have their eyes on to take over from his fellow credentialed countrymen, Mugabe and Zanu-PF.
The majority may not be right all the time, but they have spoken. By the very democratic edifice that Mugabe put at their disposal through the latest polls, the verdict is out. The President has no other choice but to pay heed.
I understand that the Southern African Development Community (SADC) is having an indaba on Zimbabwe tomorrow.
Whatever SADC may come up with or not, the writing seems to be on the wall and this summit offers SADC a much-needed eleventh hour face-saving exercise.
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