No wholesale recall of Mujuru MPs, that would be suicide for all concerned especially Mugabe

"In Chipinge South, some war veterans and party members demonstrated last week against their MP. Enock Porusingazi, who has been suspended from the party for 5 years, for allegedly backing the former vice president (Joice Mujuru)" reported Nehanda Radio.

The demonstrators were demanding that the MP be recalled and thus trigger a bye-election. Demands for such recalls is something Mugabe and Mnangagwa can expect and will find increasing difficult to ignore as the country's economic situation gets worse and worse because the demands are coming from those desperate to escape from the growing poverty and view the parliamentary seat as their ticket out of poverty.

Mugabe has fired most if not all Mujuru faction ministers, deputy ministers and Joice herself from her Vice President position. Firing them from their appointed positions was easy but dismissing them as MP is proving to be one of those damned if he does and damned if they does not!

Some people have argued that the Mujuru faction MPs together with the MDC MPs could make it difficult for Mugabe or Mnangagwa (if the later does finally hand over the reins of power) to rule. Those people are wrong; the Zimbabwe parliament is one of those institutions that Mugabe has rendered totally useless if it was a guard dog then it is without teeth, blind, deaf as a stone and whose bark is more a laboured cough than a bark.

All those people fighting to be MPs are under no illusion that they would be able to change anything; for the last 34 years Mugabe has always had his way, not even one MP in all these years can ever say he/she forced Mugabe to change his set path. People fight to be MP because it is the most secured first class gravy train seat.

Real political power has been in Mugabe's hands first and foremost assisted by the Joint Operations Command. He has dished out all the other gravy train tickets as he pleased and is not particularly bothered about who is in parliament and who is not.

The pressure to have the Mujuru faction MPs thrown out of parliament is coming from those Mnangagwa faction members who, having failed to secure the other gravy train tickets, are feeling the ill effects of the worsening economic situation and therefore desperate to escape.


Since Mugabe and Zanu PF have already shown since the rigged July 2013 elections that they have no solution to the country's economic meltdown the scene is therefore set. As long as this Zanu PF regime remains in power the economic meltdown will only get worse. As long as the rising tide of poverty continues to threaten more and more Mnangagwa faction members will be demanding that Mujuru faction members must be thrown out of parliament and free up these gravy train tickets.

Throwing out Mujuru faction MPs out of parliament would be ease, the party can easily fire them out of the party triggering a recall and bye-elections. The real challenge for Mugabe is making sure that he wins the bye-election.


Mugabe cannot afford to lose the bye-elections because any opposition MP will mean replacing his placid toothless guard dog with even a tiny chiwawa. An elephant like Zanu PF has little to fear from a Chiwawas; nonetheless an elephant has been known to flap its ears in annoyance at the persistent yapping of a chiwawa. So the pressure is on him to win the bye-elections.

On the other hand Mugabe can only be sure of electoral victory if he rigs the vote. He rigged the 2013 elections and that was not easy because even today there are still many questions left unanswered about those elections and he has been fighting ever since to keep a lid on. Any talks of bye-elections have threatened to open the whole matter. What makes it worse here is that he will be cheating his former Zanu PF people; the same individuals who helped him rig the 2013 elections.

If there was to be any slip up and the world was to have concrete evidence of Mugabe rigging the elections then the pressure he is already feeling for having rigged the 2013 elections will increase a thousand fold; it will be political suicide!

The only circumstance that will force Mugabe to recall the MPs and force a bye-election is if the Mujuru faction MPs were to formerly break away and form their own political party. So far former VP Mujuru has publically announced that she will remain faithful to Mugabe and Zanu PF; most of her supporters will do the same. Most of her supporters know Zanu PF rigged the July 2013 elections and therefore they would lose either way if there was a bye-election. If there was a free and fair election the opposition MDC factions would win or the vote is rigged again then the Mugabe backed candidate will win.

In these turbulent political and economic times the Mujuru faction MPs will keep their heads below the political pulpit just to hang on to the gravy train ticket.       

If Mugabe could stop any of the MPs dying just to avoid bye-elections he would – that is how much the tyrant dread bye-elections. Whilst he can afford to lose the odd bye-election he cannot afford to lose a whole string of them and so there will be no wholesale sacking of Mujuru faction MPs. Mnangagwa faction members desperate to escape the economic hardship can demand the wholesale sacking of the MPs all they like; it is not going to happen, period.