ED admit to rigging but refuse reforms insisting "let bygones be bygones" will deliver free elections - how naïve

President Emerson Mnangagwa is breathtakingly naïve; that is the one thing that has come through again and again ever since he took centre stage last November. Remember the coup that was "a military assisted transition"; well he has now come up with something even more unbelievably naïve.
 
"We want our elections to be free, fair, transparent and credible," said Mr. Mnangagwa, repeating what has become a mantra for his ZANU-PF party.

"The 75-year-old has been accused of having a hand in manipulating presidential polls in 2008, when the opposition Movement of Democratic Change won the first round but lost following a violent runoff campaign," reported Spotlight Zimbabwe, quoting The Wall Street Journal.

"Mr. Mnangagwa has denied rigging that vote and other disputed elections, although he appeared to come close to conceding that previous polls haven't always been free and fair.

"The question of free elections, now, I have said in the past we did not allow," he said, before launching into another, newly familiar phrase: Let "bygones be bygones."

Here President Mnangagwa is admitting, or be it grudgingly, for the first time ever, that Zanu PF has rigged elections in the past. However, he has pointedly refused to implement even one democratic reform. Indeed he has mockingly dismissed those calling for reforms.

"Zanu PF ichatonga! Igotonga! Imi muchingo hukura! Nokuhukura!" (Zanu PF will rule! And rule! Whilst you (calling for reforms) bark! And bark!) President Mnangagwa has often said before the November coup and has publically repeated the same thing on at least two different occasions.

In a recent article, Professor Jonathan Moyo, who was Zanu PF's principal strategist but is now in self-imposed exile because he was in the losing Zanu PF faction after the coup, has given details of how Zanu PF has rigged elections in the past and is doing so again this year.

"ZEC run by Govt to run elections is not set up in terms of the Constitution. Most of its full-time staff are former or current Army, CIO & ZRP. ALL of TECHNICAL staff is 100% from security organs & ALL polling officers are civil servants!" wrote Professor Moyo.

"On the back of the Nov coup, and the fact that Zimbabwe is under military rule, it's unreasonable to expect a Govt run ZEC to run free, fair & credible elections. With securocrats managing its TECHNICAL operations, ZEC is a rigging tool!

"Govt has seconded to ZEC a team of Chinese BVR & cyber experts from the People's Liberation Army linked to a top Chinese university. Their remit is to manipulate the voters roll through shadowy & virtual polling stations & fake voters!"

ZEC has failed to register 7 million voters because the exercise was started very late, to produce a verified voters' roll before nomination day, there other sources confirming that there is indeed a 16 member Chinese team of BVR & cyber experts in the country, etc.; proof that "ZEC is rigging tool!"

President Mnangagwa can claim these elections are free, fair and credible as many times as he wishes but, as we can see, with no reforms in place, there nothing to stop the Zanu PF blatantly rigging the elections again. He is being very naïve to suggest these elections will be free and fair because he has argued to let bygone be bygones.

Zimbabwe is in a very serious economic mess; unemployment soar to the dizzying heights of 90%, the country's education and health services have all but collapse, etc. The root cause of the mess is because the country is stuck, for the last 38 years and counting, with a corrupt, incompetent and tyrannical Zanu PF dictatorship that has rigged elections to stay in power. The only way out of this mess is for the country to implement the democratic reforms designed to stop the vote rigging.

It is already clear that Zanu PF is rigging this year's elections. What matters now is to make sure that the party does not get away with another rigged election as has happened in the past. President Mnangagwa has promised free, fair and credible elections, if he fails to deliver free elections then he and his junta friends must step down to allow the appointment of an interim administration that will implement the reforms.