MDC to lobby SADC but to no avail, they lost all credibility!

Political credibility is like chastity you lose it once and once lost there is no going back; it is gone!

Mr Douglas Mwonzora, spokesman of the MDC-T faction led by Tsvangirai, says the party will be sending a delegation to the SADC Meeting schedule for 17th and 18th August in Victoria Falls. They want to lobby SADC Heads to pressure Mugabe to implement the new Constitution.

"We are going to dispatch a delegation to inform Sadc about the dire state of the country's economy, the failure by the Zanu PF-led government to adhere to the new constitution which is a product of the GPA," said Mwonzora.

"For instance, there is an unwillingness to implement rights enshrined in the Bill of Rights, people cannot demonstrate. There are a lot of human rights violations and the most telling is in Chingwizi."

It is a futile exercise because this is the very point that SADC Heads raised with MDC throughout the life of the NGU and again before the elections last year and the latter paid no heed as MP Samuel Sipepa Nkomo has admitted.

"We failed to secure critical reforms before participating in the elections. The whole world advised us not to get into the elections without reforms, and so in everything that we have been saying we have failed to acknowledge that we also made a mistake," MP Nkomo told The Zimbabwe Independent.

"It is common knowledge that Lindiwe Zulu (President Jacob Zuma's international relations adviser) advised us. Zuma also advised us and even the Sadc Heads of State meeting in Maputo (Mozambique) also advised not to participate in the elections without electoral, media and security sector reforms, among others."

So MDC leaders completely ignore SADC Heads of State's advice for five years; not even one reform was ever implemented. Not one! Now that Mugabe has rigged the elections and kicked the MDC leaders off the gravy train they once again turn back to SADC Heads; pretending nothing ever happened, they had well behaved in the past and they are as innocent as a rose. The expect SADC to take up the fight with Mugabe on their behalf, no questions asked. Fat chance!

"If some of those people that advise you not to participate in elections are the same people who assist you, help you financially and then you ignore their advice, then they will simply refuse to assist you again," explained MP Nkomo in the interview.

SADC Heads assisted MDC in the past and it is no surprise that they refuse to assist them again afterwards. They will not assist them ever again. They will accept whatever the MDC delegates give them but only to immediately file it in the bin!

MDC – renewal led by Tendai Biti is also sending their own delegation to lobby the SADC Heads. Whatever they give the Heads it too will be similarly filed!

There are some things one can forgive and forget but failing to implement something as fundamental as the democratic reforms, not even one, in five years is so outrageous; it is impossible to dismiss it as a mere mistake. It proved that the MDC leaders were unbelievably corrupt and breathtakingly incompetent. It is naïve for them to expect the world to trust them ever again; it would be like a known prostitute wearing a chastity veil – the congregation have come to support and honour the occasion, it is unwise to repay them by insulting their intelligence!