If not Nkosana, then who do we vote for?

I AM a good wife, really I am. In fact, not to beat my own drum or anything, but if there was a scale of wifehood and my husband was asked to judge, I suspect he would give me 8 out of 10 if not more. I mean, I am after all the one who, after graduating with my PhD in something I thought was useful (the job market suggests it is not), I got myself suitably married to someone from my rural home, and became Mrs Mushonga. No double barrel Zhou-Mushonga, oh no, just plain old Dr Mrs Amai Mushonga, although the certificate says Zhou. I say this because I do not wish to create the impression that my disagreement with my husband is because I do not respect him or that I think I am better educated, but because on this one issue, him and I have disagreed.

So the other night I told my husband that I chanced upon an article written by someone called Albert Gumbo, which was titled ‘Who is Nkosana Moyo?' Now, I almost didn't read it because I thought, isn't he the minister who resigned? But, my curiosity had got the better of me, and after I read it, I just had an epiphany.

Before I read there article, I was uninspired by the MDC-T and the opposition in general and was not planning to even register to vote when they start this biometric thingy. But after telling him I was inspired, my husband, with whom I now share a name, surprised me by saying: "is he not going to be another Simba Makoni and split the vote?"

Now, I love my husband, and sometimes I listen to his arguments, but this time not. After all, I am the PhD holder that went through nine months of nausea, vomiting, and morning sickness and craving "something nice" without ever knowing quite what that was, (to be fair to him he tried to get me everything and anything, without success but still, he tried) only to give birth to a baby girl that I just knew looked like a Chantelle or Michelle, but the man whose name I now share said ‘we must name her after my grandmother. So now I am Mai Hazvinei. Very far from Chantelle, and when my PhD colleagues from all over the world send their congratulations and ask ‘what does her name mean,' I have to be inventive because how can you say you named your child ‘it doesn't matter' with a straight face in this day and age?

So this is what I told my husband. The claim that Makoni split votes in 2008 is ahistorical. The 2008 Presidential election was rigged. Morgan Tsvangirai won the election but was in fact robbed of victory by the Mudede three-month long vote tallying.

"Baba Hazvi," I said to him, this "splitting the vote" argument also assumes that the democratic space is finite, and cannot accommodate new entrants. This is the type of thinking that shortchanges Zimbabweans by shrinking democracy instead of encouraging it. It arrogates entitlement to those occupying the opposition space, and out of that sense of entitlement grows hubris. It makes them claim that they own the Intellectual Property (IP) rights to being the opposition.

But, more importantly, at this stage, such thinking reduces the democratic aspirations of all Zimbabweans to one narrow narrative of removing President Robert Mugabe at any cost. It says removing Mugabe is better than providing a vision for economic transformation, a vision for a future for our lost generations, a vision for Hazvinei and her siblings. It places opposition success in the next election as the only goal, not good government or better leadership.

It is a narrative that says we do this now, (getting rid of Mugabe) using only one candidate despite their flaws, and worry about clear, working and workable plans later. This is a position that we must reject. Our Hazvinei and her brother that I am carrying now (and no, Baba Hazvi, we will not name him "Dhemeti" like his grandfather) deserve a leader with a vision. Our economy deserves an injection of sound management and stewardship, from a person with a track record of achieving in the past, not "anybody-but-Bob". Our country deserves a vision that focuses on the future, not fielding the same losing candidate over and over and expecting a different outcome.

I told Baba Hazvinei that the idea that we should be afraid to split votes suggests that compromise, based on political space and not ideas, is the way to go. That a coalition of politicians for political positions, and discussions of who occupies which post in said coalitions, is more important than policies. It is wrong that those with great ideas transcending what is being offered by the current established opposition must stay at home or subordinate their ideas to the mediocrity on offer. It is not right that the nation should come second to an orderly coalition arrangement.

That "who heads the coalition" is the most important question occupying all discussions of a coalition says it all. Zimbabweans deserve a candidate that talks about their future, not political positions.

In any event, even Baba Hazvinei agrees with me that the coalition of politicians that was referred to as the GNU and the subsequent disintegration of the opposition movement into a mushroom field of parochial interests has left a fair share of disappointed and disaffected voters that yearn for change. Not just change from Zanu-PF and the rape of the country but change from politics as usual.
Real change. I am one of them. If not Nkosana with his good qualities, who is there to vote for?

This "splitting the vote" narrative relies on the false argument that all Zimbabweans are mortgaged to either Zanu-PF or MDC-T. It does not contemplate the voter who is put off by both sides, and will not participate unless a viable third choice is offered. It assumes that we are saying to the person who sat out the 2008 and 2013 elections because of not having someone worthy of their vote: come 2018 we are giving you the same choice: you can have any candidate you want as long as it is the ones you did not find worthy in 2008 and 2013. It does not say "we heard you in 2013 and so here is a better option".

But even more, it relies on a failure to properly articulate issues relevant to particular voters. You cannot appeal to a villager that freely voted for Robert Mugabe in 2013 by saying that we want to remove him because he forces people to vote for him. That makes you appear out of touch and unlikely to address that villager's pressing problems.

How many times has Baba Hazvinei himself heard me shouting at the computer when a prominent MDC-T member posts something on social media about Macron's wife or patronising to women? Does this splitting the vote argument mean that I should still hold my nose and vote for them? Lord no, I am good enough a wife to make sacrifices and accept things from my husband and his family (Hazvinei is actually a very good name), but I should not also be expected to agree with this logic.

So I told him, Baba Hazvinei, that come 2018, I will definitely be voting, but for the best candidate. And in the end, even he agrees that if our politics were mature and we voted people into office based on capability, Nkosana is by far the best candidate whose name is floating around right now. And that our politics has always failed to attract people of such calibre, who have been somewhere and have considerable knowledge, expertise and experience from across the world. Well, until now, because now we have a candidate worth voting for.

It is about time……

Mai va Hazvinei Mushonga (PhD in Sociology, working in the NGO sector)