MDC-T Guardian Council equally confused

Efforts to bring together the breakaway MDC Team led by Tendai Biti and the MDC-T faction led by Morgan Tsvangirai will not add any value to the opposition politics as the so called "Guardian Council" led by Sekai Holland is equally clueless.

I could not control my skepticism when I read in press that this motley crew is trying to resolve the differences that exist between the Biti and Tsvangirai factions.   

Though it is very clear that the MDC-T has consistently failed to achieve election victory for the past 15 years, some of its members and supporters are still under the illusion that, maybe through some divine intervention, heir party will one outfox the ruling party.

To start with, the Guardian council is itself divided into three camps, pro-Tsvangirai, pro-Biti and fence sitters. At the hyped-about meeting to come up with strategies to reunite the party, not all members of the Council attended. Sipepa Nkomo who is pro-Biti was conspicuously absent from the two-day meeting held by the group at Courtney Hotel in Harare. How the council envisage uniting the belligerents in the midst of disunity among themselves is a big puzzle.

It's also apparent that the Council is not exempt from the violence and intimidation meted out to other lowly members of MDC-T yet they are supposed to be high-ranking officials, the guardians of wisdom within the party.

After the Council's meeting they released a press statement which denounced the Mandel meeting that suspended Tsvangirai.

"The Guardian Council wishes to categorically state that it was never involved in the planning, convening, organising and conduct of the meeting that was held at Mandel and dissociates itself from all the resolutions of that meeting," read part of the statement.

Surprisingly, barely 72 hours later, Holland capitulated and withdrew the statement she had presented. She said that the pro-Tsvangirai team had altered it, adding that she had coerced and intimidated by "militias" into presenting a "doctored" statement. She claimed that after their meeting, they sent the statement to MDC-T leader Morgan Tsvangirai for him to have a look and the party leader made a few but radical changes before the information department allegedly "doctored" it to focus on discrediting the Mandel Training Centre meeting that purportedly suspended Tsvangirai and other party leaders.

The Council needs to put its own house in order and unite first before they make any claim to the role of advisor.

In a clear indication that the Council's efforts will come to naught, MDC-T secretary general Tendai Biti has since announced that the renewal team will soon be forming a new party.

Whether or not the two MDC factions decide to unite, I doubt if any difference will ever be noticed. In fact, the situation will worsen as the two faction leaders will continue to fight for leadership. MDC-T politics is like a tree that will never bear any fruits, even sour fruits.

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Peacemaker Zano can be contacted at peacemakerzano@gmail.com