PRIME Minister (PM) Morgan Tsvangirai's Movement for Democratic Change (MDC-T) party's election machinery rolled into the City of Kings and Queens a fortnight ago, briefly painting the city red and sending a veiled message to rivals that the party cannot be written off.

The MDC-T is facing a threat to its dominance from the smaller MDC faction which joined forces with Dumiso Dabengwa of ZAPU at the beginning of the month to appeal to more voters.

Political observers said the MDC-ZAPU alliance could potentially weaken the MDC-T's influence in the Bulawayo province.

White City Stadium, in Pelandaba, thousands of MDC-T supporters turned up to hear from the premier who is fighting to dislodge President Robert Mugabe from power.

White City Stadium, which has a sitting capacity of about 5 000 people proved to be too small a venue for the MDC-T rally, as supporters filled it to capacity.

Several youths, unable to gain entry into the stadium grounds, had to perch on billboards in order to follow the proceedings.

Party jingles played on a public address system made women to stand and dance to the sing-along-tunes, much to the amusement of the crowd.

MDC-T bigwigs such as secretary general Tendai Biti, Tsvangirai's deputy Thokozani Khupe, organising secretary Nelson Chamisa, Sesel Zvidzai and Theresa Makone gave speeches, imploring voters to vote for their party.

The PM's wife, Elizabeth also tried her hand at campaigning for her husband and asked him to deliver on his election promises as the people had faith and trusted in him.

While the PM's address touched on issues close to the hearts of voters in Bulawayo which include devolution of power, revival of industry, water shortages and the 1980's Gukurahundi killings, proverbially the PM relied on his "change" mantra that catapulted him onto the country's political stage in 2000 and made him become the darling of the middle class, workers and grassroots Zimbabweans.

With the MDC's election campaign hinged on job creation in the next five years after assuming government, its election manifesto is widely seen as a tall order given the contraction of the Zimbabwean economy in the past 13 years.

The PM's address appeared to navigate away from giving detail on how exactly the MDC-T would achieve its objectives, gravitating instead around the familiar territory of urging President Mugabe to leave office.

Critics have pointed to the continued inference that President Mugabe must leave office, as evidence of the dearth of strategy and policies on the part of the MDC-T to contest the political space and mould itself into a viable opposition party, 13 years after its entry onto the political stage.

Trevor Maisiri, a senior analyst with the International Crisis Group, agrees. He said the election is no longer about removing President Mugabe from power.

"As much as it was about that in the previous elections, this time around Zimbabweans appear more hungry for the development of their country and are going to pay attention to policy issues and capacity of the parties and candidates to deliver the development agenda," said Maisiri.

But Michael Mdladla, a political analyst disagreed, saying it remains an election to change things.

"People are not concerned about policies but change of face of the presidency. Zimbabweans have been having one leader for the past 33 years and other countries in the region have changed leaders and seem to be performing better economically, hence people have hope that if they change leadership maybe there would be prospects of improved standards of living," said Mdladla.

It is evident that the election contest between President Mugabe and PM Tsvangirai is less than a contest of policies as the two parties have tried to make the electorate believe, but is a bitter finale between two long-time rivals, whose place in Zimbabwe's political future hangs in the balance.