'We were not nikuved,' says MDC-T MP

MDC-T Renewal Team interim national chairman, Samuel Sipepa-Nkomo has said the MDC-T lost last years' elections fairly because the party was not well- prepared.

This is contrary to claims by former Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai who is on record saying President Robert Mugabe's Zanu-PF hired an Israel firm, Nikuv, to rig the polls.

Sipepa-Nkomo said MDC-T lost the elections because the party was relaxed prior to the July 31 national elections.

"I believe that we lost the election and if we were 'nikuved' I would not have won," said Sipepa-Nkomo.

"I believe that we went to sleep and lost the election."

Addressing a meeting organised by civic organisations in Bulawayo last week, Sipepa-Nkomo said MDC-T had no campaign resources such as transport and it was impossible for them to win under such circumstances.

Sipepa-Nkomo said the MDC-T Team met at Mandel Training Centre and not Harvest House to suspend Tsvangirai because they were afraid of being beaten up by hooligans.

"The question that is being asked is why we met at Mandel and not at Harvest house? Well, if we had decided to meet at Harvest House we were going to be beaten up," said Sipepa-Nkomo.

He claimed that many people were going to join his renewal team because there was too much violence in the MDC-T where people with diverse opinions were being beaten up for expressing their views.

"When people deny that there is violence happening at Harvest House, I begin to doubt their credibility because I sit in the national council and I was there when people were beaten," he said.

The former minister of Water said the MDC-T was on the verge of collapse.

However, MDC-T deputy organising secretary, Abedinico Bhebhe said the renewal team was doomed to fail.

"Let's assume that you want to impeach Robert Mugabe and surely can you go to a hotel in Botswana and say we have impeached Mugabe," said Bhebhe.

"It shows that there are some people who do not take Zimbabweans seriously and think that Zimbabweans are lunatics who do not think.

He vehemently denied incidences of violence at Harvest House, the party's headquarters.