Road to Victory (R2V): Nelson Chamisa on Tuesday

Thank You Bulawayo

It was a heartening sojourn into the city of Kings and Queens at the weekend as the ambience and camaraderie amply testified to a city ready to step into a new country.

The crowd was huge, the atmosphere at the White City Stadium was electric and scintillating, arguably our biggest crowd so far while the trip to the Dr Joshua Nkomo Museum enabled me the opportunity to shake hands with a glorious and revolutionary past.

I felt tears welling in my eyes when I was told that I was the first national leader to pay homage at the iconic Father Zimbabwe's memorial monument in Matsheumhlope.

For me, the late Dr Joshua Nkomo will always be a source of inspiration, notwithstanding the regime's perennial attempt to belittle and undermine his national contribution.

He will always be an undisputed national hero and I immediately ordered the Bulawayo City Council to ensure that the museum is upgraded to a level of a strategic national institution that does not have to pay rates to the local authority. The Joshua Mqabuko Nkomo museum is a strategic national heritage state that honours the life of one of Zimbabwe's undisputed national heroes.

The Nkomo brand is a towering brand that must be accorded veneration by all of us, especially the local authority that we control. Sparing such an institution the obligation to pay rates will be the city's own humble way of paying tribute to the mammoth and indefatigable national brand that was Joshua Nkomo.  

The huge crowd that turned up at White City stadium on Saturday in its own unique way answered its own questions and stood testimony to the successful rebranding that the party has undergone and the growing confidence and faith that the people continue to repose in our democratic movement.   

I saw the old and the desperate, the young and the impatient, the restless and the carefree all ready to walk into a novel moment----a new Zimbabwe.

Bulawayo showed it was a city all set to step out and meet a new destiny. I saw a people ready and prepared to shake the hand of destiny and to behold the new.

I engaged students, pastors, business leaders, ZIPRA veterans, and persons with disability (PWDs), young entrepreneurs and ordinary citizens. The enriching engagements were a stultifying odyssey into the dreams and aspirations of the diverse sectors in the country's second largest city who all wish for the best for their country.

Thank you Bulawayo for showing the way.
 
Thank you for the memories!

Washing in the blood of our revolutionary struggle
While in Bulawayo, I felt the warmth of history and the accompaniment of the spirit of our patriots who irrigated the tree of our national independence with their own blood.

 From the Joshua Nkomo museum, I went to Nkulumane to meet with another distinguished son and war veteran---Jabulani Sibanda.

For one and half hours while at his home, we shared our aspirations and the vision for the future of the country that both of us so much love. At the end, we discovered we shared the same passion for a future with multiple possibilities for the people of Zimbabwe.

This April being the independence month for us as a party and as a leadership, I discovered that there was more that united us; that we had the same unstinting affinity for our country and its people.

I discovered we suckled from the same breast of patriotism and soon.

Thanks brother Jabu for the great conversation as we prepare to step hand in hand into the new Zimbabwe that is coming in a few months time.

I also noted that there have been outright distortions, lies and spin around my visit to the Joshua Nkomo museum and my meeting with Jabulani. Yet lies have temporary legs and the truth shall be revealed in the fullness of time.

Going rural: Rural Zimbabwe here we come
After a brief foray into the city, we return to the rural areas this coming weekend to take into the villages the gospel of the tripod promise of transformation, opportunities and prosperity that undergird our vision for the country.

Rural Zimbabwe is our focus in this election campaign. In the next few months, we intend to step on every blade of grass in every village in the rural outlays where the majority of our people live.

Our campaign will be largely rural and after heartening trips to Murehwa and Chiweshe two weeks ago, we spread the Alliance leadership into various rural areas from Manicaland to Tsholotsho, from Chirundu to Mount Darwin to spread the message of the imminent change.

Our message is 2018 munhu wese kubasa (Everyone should go to Work). Our message is 2018 dhora muhomwe (the dollar back in the pocket).

We intend to scatter ourselves throughout the country as we take the gospel of transformation to the villages.

I will be covering several rural areas this coming weekend. For those in the rural areas, come and let us reason together.

Come let us transact the true national business by sharing our vision for a new Zimbabwe that sets in come September 2018.

Behold the new!

One Zimbabwe, one people.
One Zimbabwe, one future.
One Zimbabwe, one vision.
God bless Zimbabwe.
God bless Africa.

Adv. Nelson Chamisa is the MDC-T President and MDC Alliance Presidential Candidate