MDC mount spirited fight 'to protect vote' - too late, Zanu-PF has stolen the vote already

The spirit is willing but the intellect is weak. MDC Alliance leaders and supporters are like an army mounting a spirited attack of an enemy on top of a hill when it was them who had the hill top advantage to start will but gave it up without a fight! Of course, it was a foolish decision to have given up the hill top advantage just as it is a foolish to fight a lost uphill battle!

If MDC leaders and supporters alike were warned once they were warned 100 000 times of the folly of going into these elections without first implementing the democratic reforms designed to stop Zanu pf rigging these elections. Take away Zanu PF's carte blanche powers to rig the elections and it will be an uphill battle for the party to win the election.

"MDC has developed stringent measures to stop Zanu PF rigging the elections!" MDC leaders insisted. Whatever these stringent measures were, that is if they existed at all, were totally ineffective. ZEC even had the chic not to produce a clean and verified voters' roll, it an essential requirement for many of Zanu PF's vote rigging schemes. Everybody with half a brain was convinced even the stupid MDC leaders will not make the mistake of going into the elections without something as basic as a verified voters' roll. "Morgan Tsvangirai made the stupid mistake of going into the 2013 elections with no verified voters' roll." Chamisa announce. "I will not repeat the same mistake!"

He did repeat the mistake. President Mnangagwa, like Mugabe before him, never feared that MDC leaders will ever boycott the elections to pressure Zanu PF to implement the democratic reforms regardless how flawed and illegal the election process got. He knew that as long as Zanu PF offered a few gravy train seats MDC leaders will participate and that is exactly what happened in 2013 and again this year.

The elections went ahead, Zanu PF secured its landslide 2/3 majority in parliament and senate. ZEC declared President Mnangagwa the winner of the presidential race. Nelson Chamisa has since mounted a spirited challenge of Mnangagwa's victory in the Con-Court. And MDC members are joining this fight in support of their leader.

"The MDC Veterans Activists Association (VAA) has started mobilising supporters and members of the organisation to back MDC Alliance leader Nelson Chamisa during the Constitutional Court (ConCourt) challenge proceedings against President-elect Emmerson Mnangagwa on Wednesday," reported NewsDay.

MDC VAA secretary-general Charles Musimiki told Southern Eye on Saturday that his organisation was in solidarity with Chamisa and the Zimbabwean electorate in the petition.

"The electorate clearly spoke their wish through the ballot. It is our sincere appeal to all veterans to get out of their schedules and join hands with our president on August 22 in Harare for the court proceedings. All roads should lead to Harare, come Wednesday," said MDC VAA Secretary General Charles Musimiki.

"Our country, our democracy, our vote is at stake and it needs us all as veterans of change to engage our commitment gear into motion to protect the aforementioned."

Poor, poor Musimiki the spirit is willing but the intellect to know WHEN to fight is clearly lacking. When MDC foolishly agree to go into these elections without even something as basic as a verified voters' roll the party recklessly sold-out the electorate's right to a free, fair and credible vote! No amount of sit-in and prayers will ever recover the stolen votes and Zanu PF's landslide victory.

Even if the Con-Court was to rule in favour of Chamisa and hand him the presidency, no doubt that will tickle Chamisa's bloated ego to no end. But what good will that be to Zimbabwe. Like it or not President Chamisa will never accomplish anything of note with a 2/3 majority Zanu PF parliament and senate, a Zanu PF controlled judiciary, civil service, security services, etc.

Zimbabwe is in deep, deep economic and political trouble, after 38 years of corrupt and tyrannical Zanu PF rule. What the country needs desperately is a competent and democratically accountable government and for that we need to implement the democratic reforms, the pre-requisite for free, fair and credible elections.

The only thing worth fighting for is the right to free, fair and credible elections. These elections were not free, fair and credible because by agreeing to contest with no reforms Chamisa had, per se, sold out on their being free and fair. Chamisa's fight in the Con-Court is, per se, in pursuance of a lost cause; in our struggle for free, fair and credible elections, the case is of no consequence, at best, and a distraction at worst!

It is disheartening that Zimbabwe is still failing to hold free, fair and credible elections; in this day and age, 2 500 years after the Greeks gave the world democracy and 38 years after our own independence! We had the curse of having tyrants like Robert Mugabe and his Zanu PF thugs who betrayed the nation by imposing this de facto one-party dictatorship.

To make matters worse, we have also had corrupt and incompetent opposition politicians like Chamisa who have wasted every opportunity to end the dictatorship. Poor MDC supporters, they have no clue what is happening; they sheepishly marched downhill only to fight uphill. They have lacked the intellect to question the folly of it all.