Now that Chamisa and Mugabe make their union official I feel utterly betrayed

Lost in the MDC Manifesto launch and the furor surrounding our demonstration in the streets of Harare was the fact that a Robert Mugabe surrogate spoke at the demonstration for the MDC and against President Emmerson Mnangagwa.

While the flirtation and collaboration between Mugabe and MDC Alliance President Nelson Chamisa has been the stuff of whispers in recent weeks, with backroom meetings and hints about some sort of unofficial support, everything came out of the open on Tuesday.

The national spokesperson of the National Patriotic Front (NPF), the brainchild of the deposed Mugabe and his G40 allies, Jealously Mawarire, not only joined the rally, she was honoured to address the crowd.

It has become abundantly clear that more than being the spokesperson of the NPF, Mawarire has become the voice of Mugabe, so in essence, absurdly, the deposed leader was speaking at the MDC rally.

Other NPF members who also attended the march included former Zanu PF Harare South MP Shadreck Mashayamombe and former Chipango militia leader Jim Kunaka.

Anyone who thinks that the current MDC party is still the movement of Morgan Tsvangirai will have been rocked to their senses by the sight of Mugabe's spokesperson and some of his main thugs standing side by side with Chamisa and his allies.

When you invite an official of another party to speak at a rally, it is clear that there is authorised endorsement. The cat was finally let out of the bag, and it is abundantly clear that Chamisa and Mugabe are now officially colleagues in every sense of the word.

Chamisa has let the old man back into politics and potentially the portals of power just when Zimbabwe was beginning to breathe some fresh air in a new Zimbabwe, free of the dictator.

This makes a complete mockery not only of everything that the MDC stands for, but also Chamisa's whole strategy. The MDC President has been telling us for months that he will bring change, that our country needs to turn a new leaf and that Mnangagwa is too old to rule, when all along Chamisa has been in bed with the 94-year-old.

Bringing Mugabe in from the cold means that Zimbabwe will go backwards, we will remain tied to the autocratic past and the gains we have made in these past few months will have been for naught.

For any life-long MDC supporter like myself, there is perhaps no more frightening prospect for my party and my beloved country than the thought of being aligned with Mugabe.

Sadly, this is the reality now smacking people like me in the face.

I refused to believe it before. I put it down to rumours and opposition propaganda and even if there were contacts, without official endorsement they would have little basis or effect on my party.

However, this all changed when I heard Jealously Mawarire speaking at my rally. She and the other Mugabe proxies made me sick to my stomach and is now making me rethink my allegiance.

All my life I have stood and fought against everything Mugabe stands for. When that was the MDC I stood with them.

Now, however, when Mugabe stands with the MDC it is making me contemplate the improbable, if not the formerly impossible, and making me seriously consider putting my ballot in for Emmerson Mnangagwa, a Zanu PF leader.

Now that Chamisa and Mugabe have made their union official, it has left me bewildered and starting to reconsider my positions.

Perhaps above everything else that he has done in the short time he has been at the helm of the MDC, this has made me abhor Nelson Chamisa the most.

I feel utterly betrayed.