Tsvangirai warned over Chamisa ouster

MDC-T leader Morgan Tsvangirai has been advised to create a balancing act following the defeat of one of his top lieutenants Nelson Chamisa at the just ended party congress.

Chamisa fell by the wayside when he was beaten to the party's secretary general post by former spokesperson Douglas Mwonzora. This is despite the fact that Chamisa had got the majority nominations in the run up to the congress.

Following Chamisa's defeat, a number of conspiracy theories have sprouted with some members alleging that Tsvangirai was uneasy at the former organising secretary's ambitions, thus engineered his electoral loss.

Others blamed Chamisa for the party's performance in last year's elections saying the chaotic internal primary polls pointed to failure on his part.

Former Tsvangirai's advisor Dr Alex Magaisa in an opinion piece on his website titled A View on the Electoral Outcome of the MDC-T Congress, said Chamisa remained strategic in the party and the former Prime Minister's handling of his case would be critical in the future of the party. Dr Magaisa however said the defeat was not the end of Chamisa's political career.

"For his part, Tsvangirai needs to perform an important balancing act and do what leaders do which is to harness all capacity and deploy it where it can best serve the ultimate purpose," said Dr Magaisa.

"(Professor) Jonathan Moyo lost Tsholotsho in the last elections but because (President) Mugabe knew of his strategic importance in his scheme, he found a home for him.

"The outcomes of democratic processes have to be qualified by the demands of political pragmatism. How he deals with this situation will be very critical to the future of the party."

Dr Magaisa expressed misgivings over the current leadership structure that he said was not "properly set for the deployment of people by their best talents."

He said Chamisa was the best party spokesperson after the late Learnmore Jongwe, and contesting for the position of organising secretary was probably a bad decision.

"I have little doubt that he would have done well there during the years that he became the commissar. Attending to the commissariat, which in the MDC is called the national organising department, was probably not the best political decision," said Dr Magaisa.

"It brought its problems and conflicts, especially in the run-up to last year's elections and this too, might have worked unfavourably in the most recent contest."

Dr Magaisa said Tsvangirai knows that Chamisa was probably his biggest public backer when Tendai Biti and other senior party officials left the party to form the MDC Renewal.

"He stood by him and for that reason took some serious flak, attracting all sorts of unpalatable labels, which may also be the cause of the political price that he has to pay," said Dr Magaisa.

"Chamisa will feel that he has been hard done by; that probably, he has been betrayed. One can understand the hurt but he will need to accept what has happened with grace and look to a future whose promise has not been diminished in a permanent sense."

Dr Magaisa said the MDC-T had failed to "properly and clearly" set out the structures in a manner that does not cause dispute.

"This was a cause of serious problems in the primary election process before the 2013 elections with disputes over who constituted the electoral colleges meant to vote for candidates," said Dr Magaisa.

"This caused serious divisions which caused resentment among members. There were serious complaints from across the country because of this weakness and going forward, the MDC needs to attend to it. As long as the structures remain unclear and vague, there will be problems in the internal electoral processes."