Chamisa's war on women

My parents called me Faith because they are believers. Believers in the Gospel. Believers in God. Believers in a bright and better future for their children.

They wanted their little daughter - who they saw as equal toher brothers - to never lose faith; neither in her country, her religion or her future.

Unfortunately, in recent weeks, I have lost complete and utter faith in my party under the leadership of Nelson Chamisa. While his appearances in the UK were utterly embarrassing (in particular the lies and exaggerations on BBC Hardtalk), I have decided to leave the MDC for other reasons entirely: Chamisa's war on 52% of the country, us women.

First there was the full-frontal attack on Dr. Khupe. The violence and aggression Chamisa's vanguard directed at her and her supporters were petrifying. I attended that famous rally which left members of our party bloodied for supporting the ‘wrong' candidate, and their crimson splattered garments will forever be engraved in my mind.

But upon Morgan Tsvangirai's passing, my mind was not yet made up. Clearly the MDC constitution showed that Dr. Khupe was the democratically rightful heir to the leadership. She, after all, was the only deputy president of the party who had actually been elected by the grassroots, the rank and file, the lifeblood of the party. However at the time I too was enamoured by the young charisma of Nelson Chamisa. So I gave him a chance.

Then came the sister incident. To hear those patriarchal, condescending words come out of his mouth in the Shona tongue broke my heart. Was this really our new leader? Would Morgan dream of making such disgusting misogynisticcomments? Now I know they were supposedly made as a "joke", and I know they were supposed to be "funny", but that is just the sort of patriarchal attitude which still holds in part of our society which we must fight.

Who decides whether us women are offended by such distasteful jokes? The men? Chamisa?

Just look at the explosion on Twitter and the response in the media. Women were unhappy, many were outright disgusted. Why? Because it is this sort of attitude which underpins the rabid plague of domestic abuse, rape and violence towards women in our country. To know that one of our presidential candidates could "joke" like this about his little sister, cuts to the very core of the problematic attitude many Zimbabwean men still hold towards our women.

And finally there is the inspiring and wonderful Jesse Majome. Majome an MP for Harare-West for the last decade was one of those characters we could look up to. She gave us faith. Yesterday she announced that she was being driven out the party:

"However, sadly for me in this primary election, I have noted several factors that I cannot ignore, which I have highlighted to my party which I believe, honestly, constitute manipulation of my party guidelines towards a fair outcome to the extent in my view regrettably so, that the will of bona fide and genuine Harare Westerners would be lost in that process."

One by one the towering female figures in our party are being driven out. One by one my faith the MDC is being eroded.

Do not get me wrong, I will not vote Zanu-PF, I never have done, neither has my family. However, I simply cannot vote for the MDC-T in their current format. Chamisa's war on women is one step too far for me. In 2018 it is time the women of Zimbabwe made their voices heard and said,"enough is enough".

Faith, Harare