Tsvangirai must be watched

That Morgan Tsvangirai, leader of the opposition MDC-T party, is a dangerous loser, who is staring a potentially career-ending defeat in 2018, has become a notorious fact not just for casual political observation but as a subject of scientific inquiry.

There have been quite heated debates in the past fortnight about the prospects of the opposition, whether in the form of the MDC-T as a singular party or as a collective of parties with the likely leadership of Tsvangirai; and these discussions have stemmed from findings of Afrobarometer, an influential thinktank, and a separate paper done by an academic and former MDC-T director-general, Toendepi Shonhe.

It is an equally notorious fact that the MDC-T itself has been in terminal decline and that the leadership of Tsvangirai reasonably and sustainably can no longer go beyond 2018 where he is likely to face yet another defeat at the hands of President Mugabe and Zanu-PF.

Against this buffeting background, it will be useful to demonstrate that Tsvangirai, with full knowledge of his diminished prospects, has just decided not to leave the stage of electoral politics gracefully.

In fact, in this connection, he seeks to reinvent himself post-2018 as some kind of rogue leader that not only extends his fruitless leadership of MDC-T, but also re-emerges as a new phenomenon possibly leading a bloody rebel group in the fashion of Afonso Dhlakama's Renamo in Mozambique, which he, by the way, has long admired.

There is enough basis for this, which makes it within the national interest to closely watch Tsvangirai by authorities vested with duties to maintain peace and security in the country as well as by the peace loving populace at large.

If one were to analyse the MDC-T leader's public speeches over the past year, it will be noted that he has increasingly inclined himself towards an unconstitutional regime change that has basis in mass uprising and anarchy.

The opposition has long been fascinated with the idea of a "winter of discontent" and since this time last year, it will be recalled, various groupings linked to the opposition tried to launch street campaigns that were intended to culminate in a nationwide uprising.

These actions reached their climax with the so-called national shutdown in July but then the opposition instituted a vehicle of sustained protests and/or violence in the name of the National Electoral Reform Agenda.

Nera was formed in June as an informal grouping of 10 or so parties led by MDC-T.

Since then, it has been the main driver of the concept of street protests and it can be safely concluded that Nera is an auxiliary arm tasked with conducting civic actions of anarchy and violence. It is driven by the MDC-T, with party secretary general Douglas Mwonzora as main convenor with MDC-T thugs on the frontline.

It is not surprising, then, that for a number of occasions, Tsvangirai has stood on the prop of Nera with the latest incident being in March where various opposition figures, including Didymus Mutasa, endorsed him as the leader of an envisaged coalition of opposition parties.

This particular rally flopped spectacularly, with only 200 people turning up.

Quite tellingly, Tsvangirai betrayed a particular salivation for street demonstrations as a way towards change of the constitutional order,promising that Nera would conduct massive street demos.

Voyeurism

Aside of his preponderance of violence which is best captured by that infamous speech at Rufaro Stadium threatening to remove President Mugabe violently, Tsvangirai has a particular voyeurism for violence that has taken place from places such as North Africa during the Arab Spring to Gambia where Yahya Jammeh was forced out by a West African regional force.

And he has sunk even lower.

At yet another Nera rally in Chinhoyi a few days ago Tsvangirai revelled in the violence that took place at a soccer match between rival giants Highlanders and Dynamos in Bulawayo.

The disturbances at the Barbourfields took place after some home fans did not take kindly to alleged bad officiating that saw a Dynamos player score a contested goal. There have been similar skirmishes and violence previously and Tsvangirai enthused that such violence "could visit the country".

He couched this within the context of electoral processes.

"ZEC is a referee and we have a referee that throws away the whistle and joins the other team. That is not a referee.

"That is what we are telling ZEC, that if you don't become an impartial referee then you are creating conditions for violence. We are not going to stand and watch when we have been cheated," said the opposition leader.

We shall return to this serious proposition by the MDC-T leader.

It is, however, important to bring to light the subtext of Tsvangirai's glorification of violence at the soccer match.

This was not just an unwitting populist statement.

It sought to exploit the tribal undercurrents that characterise the rivalry between the two giants of Zimbabwe that have been especially nursed by some malcontents on both sides.

For Tsvangirai it was about seeking to curry favour with especially the tribalist and regional elements within the sub bracket of sport in the same way that he has sought to mine capital from the past in the so-called Gukurahundi episode.

Tsvangirai is desperate for any kind of spark, even from a soccer match, that will not only put the constitutional order aside but also extend his leadership of the MDC-T.

Going Trump

We return to Tsvangirai's attitude towards ZEC and its administration of elections.

It has become increasingly apparent that Tsvangirai is seeking to discredit the elections body as a basis to rejecting the results in 2018 and through Nera and other platforms has campaigned for outside management of the elections.

On May Day, he told workers at a rally that he was taking after US President Donald Trump, who before his election last year said he would not accept defeat to then rival Hillary Clinton.

He said: "We will not accept any outcome which is not victory for the opposition, ndakuita hwaTrump manje. Trump said he will not accept the result if he does not come victorious."

That was more to tell his supporters that he knew world events, and possibly announce who the new master in Washington is.

And he emphasised: "If I do not win in 2018 I will not accept the election result because it is very simple. How does a minority win over the majority. How (can) a minority divided, fragmented and imploding win over a united opposition?"

This is not in isolation.

It, as we have seen, is within a larger matrix. An important component is the operation of the youth wing of the party, which operates semi-autonomously and within Nera.

The leader of the Youth Assembly is the energetic Happymore Chidziva.

Chidziva, also known by his alias Leader Bvondo (Provocateur) is even feared within the MDC-T with some senior officials describing him as a thug.

He is fiercely loyal to Tsvangirai and has been fingered in intra-party violence that has rocked the party with Tsvangirai typically employing young loyalists to hound internal dissenters.

Outside the MDC-T, the otherwise affable young man — who likes wearing military fatigues styling himself as a commander of some militia — has been both mobilising youths to register and vote but also, perhaps most importantly, ensure mayhem in the face of defeat.

Last March, Chidziva told the opposition paper, the Daily News, that MDC-T would seek to subvert the electoral process.

"We are not going to allow the next election to be rigged. As youths we are going to block the election by demonstrating the whole of next year including on the day of elections," he said.

"We want to warn Zanu-PF that if they think that they will manipulate the 2018 election they are dreaming, people of Zimbabwe are not fools, we are not going to allow Zec to destroy our future."

At one Nera meeting Chidziva would also say: "We want to ensure that the country has free and fair elections. We will disrupt those elections until they are free and fair elections."

All this explains the kind of situation that Zimbabwe faces that, as we noted, must now seize those tasked with maintaining peace, order and security, as well as the public at large, so that a perennial loser, who probably does not deserve to be anywhere near State House, does not do a Dhlakama on us as a last ditch effort to his career as a foreign sponsored opposition honcho.