News / National
'God wants Mugabe to go,' says Tsvangirai
08 Jul 2013 at 19:23hrs | Views
PRIME Minister Morgan Tsvangirai, launching his third campaign to unseat veteran President Robert Mugabe, said nothing had been achieved to ensure a fairer vote but even God now wanted Mugabe to go.
An estimated 10,000 upbeat supporters, most thrusting their open palms (the MDC-T's symbol) in the air and waving party and country flags in the national colours of green, yellow, red, and black, thronged Marondera's Rudhaka stadium for the rally on Sunday.
Tsvangirai, who made a failed attempt to have the July 31 election delayed, said Mugabe's Zanu-PF party was using bureaucratic obstacles and tricks such as keeping dead people on the electoral roll to try to hold onto power.
He said that would fail because Zimbabweans were itching to remove Zanu-PF after 33 years in office and a record of disastrous economic management.
"We don't think even God wants Zimbabwe to remain in a permanent state of suffering," the 61-year-old former union leader told thousands of cheering supporters.
"We know that we did not get the reforms that we wanted but because we are people who believe in God, we will succeed."
The MDC-T leader said he was launching his election campaign "with a heavy heart", lamenting that "no reforms" had been put in place to guarantee that the July 31 polls would be free and fair.
He said his party his party had "tried our best... against serious resistance" to prepare the country for fair polls.
"We participate with a heavy heart. There are no reforms in the media, and other reforms to ensure free and fair elections have not been achieved," said Tsvangirai told more than 10,000 supporters.
At his own campaign launch on Friday, Mugabe said Zanu-PF would finish off Tsvangirai's Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) with a resounding victory. Both Zanu-PF and the Zimbabwe Electoral Commission have denied any attempt to rig the election.
Tsvangirai's party wanted the delay in the vote to allow media and security reforms, including equal access to the country's only broadcaster ZBC, which is owned by the state but is in the grip of Zanu-PF.
Although ZBC carried Mugabe's election campaign launch live on Friday, MDC officials said it had demanded $165,000 to broadcast Tsvangirai's rally on Sunday.
The MDC also wants the military, which openly campaigns for Mugabe, to stay out of politics and sign an agreement to accept the result if Mugabe loses. Army commanders often say they would not salute Tsvangirai if he won an election.
Tsvangirai said an MDC administration would repair an economy, wracked by food and fuel shortages that had shrunk by 40 percent under Zanu-PF before it was rescued by the coalition formed after the 2008 polls.
He said he would create a million jobs in five years. Around four fifths of Zimbabwe's working-age population is jobless.
"We just don't want to remove Zanu-PF and Robert Mugabe, but we are here to provide a better future," Tsvangirai said, warning of renewed hardship as he waved a bundle of the old Zimbabwe dollar notes that were abandoned in favour of the U.S. currency when inflation hit over 500 billion percent five years ago.
The MDC-T leader won the most ballots in the first round of the 2008 vote but pulled out of the second round amid violence against his supporters.
Amid the backdrop of unrest the regional and international community then pressed Mugabe into an uneasy power-sharing government with Tsvangirai.
On Friday, Mugabe, in power for 33 years, threatened to leave regional SADC bloc which had pressured him to postpone the polls.
But Tsvangirai said Mugabe had no power to withdraw from the 15-member bloc, which the country depends on heavily for aid.
"Whatever his station, he has no right to pull Zimbabwe out unilaterally without consultation," said Tsvangirai.
Political analysts say another contested result could interrupt Zimbabwe's recovery from a decade of economic decline that has forced hundreds of thousands to flee the southern African country.
There has been little of the violence and intimidation seen before past elections and Tsvangirai said his MDC believed it would "win, and win big". But he said that, whoever wins, the legitimacy of the result was under threat.
"What we have witnessed in the last few weeks is a concerted effort designed to rob the election of legitimacy," he said.
An estimated 10,000 upbeat supporters, most thrusting their open palms (the MDC-T's symbol) in the air and waving party and country flags in the national colours of green, yellow, red, and black, thronged Marondera's Rudhaka stadium for the rally on Sunday.
Tsvangirai, who made a failed attempt to have the July 31 election delayed, said Mugabe's Zanu-PF party was using bureaucratic obstacles and tricks such as keeping dead people on the electoral roll to try to hold onto power.
He said that would fail because Zimbabweans were itching to remove Zanu-PF after 33 years in office and a record of disastrous economic management.
"We don't think even God wants Zimbabwe to remain in a permanent state of suffering," the 61-year-old former union leader told thousands of cheering supporters.
"We know that we did not get the reforms that we wanted but because we are people who believe in God, we will succeed."
The MDC-T leader said he was launching his election campaign "with a heavy heart", lamenting that "no reforms" had been put in place to guarantee that the July 31 polls would be free and fair.
He said his party his party had "tried our best... against serious resistance" to prepare the country for fair polls.
"We participate with a heavy heart. There are no reforms in the media, and other reforms to ensure free and fair elections have not been achieved," said Tsvangirai told more than 10,000 supporters.
At his own campaign launch on Friday, Mugabe said Zanu-PF would finish off Tsvangirai's Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) with a resounding victory. Both Zanu-PF and the Zimbabwe Electoral Commission have denied any attempt to rig the election.
Tsvangirai's party wanted the delay in the vote to allow media and security reforms, including equal access to the country's only broadcaster ZBC, which is owned by the state but is in the grip of Zanu-PF.
Although ZBC carried Mugabe's election campaign launch live on Friday, MDC officials said it had demanded $165,000 to broadcast Tsvangirai's rally on Sunday.
Tsvangirai said an MDC administration would repair an economy, wracked by food and fuel shortages that had shrunk by 40 percent under Zanu-PF before it was rescued by the coalition formed after the 2008 polls.
He said he would create a million jobs in five years. Around four fifths of Zimbabwe's working-age population is jobless.
"We just don't want to remove Zanu-PF and Robert Mugabe, but we are here to provide a better future," Tsvangirai said, warning of renewed hardship as he waved a bundle of the old Zimbabwe dollar notes that were abandoned in favour of the U.S. currency when inflation hit over 500 billion percent five years ago.
The MDC-T leader won the most ballots in the first round of the 2008 vote but pulled out of the second round amid violence against his supporters.
Amid the backdrop of unrest the regional and international community then pressed Mugabe into an uneasy power-sharing government with Tsvangirai.
On Friday, Mugabe, in power for 33 years, threatened to leave regional SADC bloc which had pressured him to postpone the polls.
But Tsvangirai said Mugabe had no power to withdraw from the 15-member bloc, which the country depends on heavily for aid.
"Whatever his station, he has no right to pull Zimbabwe out unilaterally without consultation," said Tsvangirai.
Political analysts say another contested result could interrupt Zimbabwe's recovery from a decade of economic decline that has forced hundreds of thousands to flee the southern African country.
There has been little of the violence and intimidation seen before past elections and Tsvangirai said his MDC believed it would "win, and win big". But he said that, whoever wins, the legitimacy of the result was under threat.
"What we have witnessed in the last few weeks is a concerted effort designed to rob the election of legitimacy," he said.
Source - Agencies
