Why Bulawayo must vote Zanu-PF

FOR the past decade-and-a-half Bulawayo's electorate has, regrettably, ceded its support to the MDC-T. The opposition party has over the same period claimed the city and the metropolitan province at large as its own political turf.

All the parliamentary elections that have been held in the country since the formation of the MDC-T in 1999, have seen the imperialist sponsored party bagging all the parliamentary and local government seats in Bulawayo to which they have held on until only recently when it recalled some MPs from the lower house.

Despite enjoying a decade-and-a-half of dominance in certain areas of the country, mostly urban areas, the opposition party, ironically has since its formation relentlessly and unashamedly harped on the off-key rhetoric song "There is no democracy in Zimbabwe". What a shame!

MDC-T's dominance in Bulawayo and other metropolises has not meant much for the electorate as it has not brought anything new, if anything at all in terms of development to those areas.

The tendency by the MDC-T and its allies to practise what may be termed "politics of opposition" where they blindly antagonise and criticise Government policies for fun, without making efforts to analyse merits and demerits of the policies, has seen most constituencies represented by the opposition being alienated from development programmes and inevitably lagging behind in growth.

Much as the electorate in Bulawayo has over the years freely exercised its democratic right to vote for the opposition, it should go without mention that the move has returned to haunt the same electorate.

Without doubt, voting for the opposition has only served to massage egos of the electorate and has not brought anything tangible to the ordinary person's table. Protest votes are anathema to logic.

Having opposition MPs and a local authority dominated by the opposition in an environment where antagonistic politics dominates the development agenda has disconnected Bulawayo from Government. People too have been disconnected from Government.

This would only be natural as the city and the greater part of Matabeleland region does not have representatives who are able to influence policy and development programmes in favour of the region. Their core business, as instructed by their handlers, is to oppose the ruling party Zanu-PF from every angle, yet in the process negating their mandate bestowed upon them by the electorate.

Having political leaders who speak a different language and read from a different book with the incumbent Government will never help Bulawayo solve its myriad of problems.

This is not to say Government willingly neglects areas with opposition MPs and councillors, but it takes political will and initiative from the local politician to highlight their areas' needs for Government to act.

The Zimbabwe Agenda for Sustainable Socio-Economic Transformation (Zim Asset), the country's economic blueprint and the brainchild of Zanu-PF, has received criticism from the MDC-T. While the blueprint is supposed to guide the country's economic development agenda at all levels, the lack of willingness to embrace the guideline by the opposition leaders may lead to their areas lagging behind in terms of development.

The calibre of people that the opposition party has offered the electorate in Bulawayo as MPs and councllors leaves a lot to be desired, compounding the region's curse of having MPs who negate their constituencies' concerns to pander to the whims of their western donors.

Most of the MDC-T legislators were thrust into their positions and did not have a clue of what their positions entailed and what sort of obligations they owed the electorate. Some of them were ghetto loafers with little or no formal education who overnight found themselves as City Fathers, MPs or Senators.

For many politics became a gravy train, from which they had to healthily line their pockets before their terms expired. Politics became an agent of social mobility, a sad chapter in Zimbabwe's politics, thanks to MDC-T.

This could smack as a crude and personal attack on the individuals concerned, some of whom were implicated in the abuse of the Constituency Development Fund, but fact remains their calibre and the scandals they found themselves in during their tenure of office did not only shortchange the electorate but showed that the opposition's interests were not with the people but power.

The paradigm must shift and the ball is in the court of the electorate in the forthcoming by-elections to initiate the shift by voting for Zanu-PF MPs.

Social commentator Mr Cont Mhlanga said as much as it was good for local politics to have opposition MPs, the scenario was not good for development as it had seen Bulawayo being alienated from Government and development programmes initiated by the same.

He said having a political leader who was in Government would benefit Bulawayo in catching up with other areas in terms of development.

"The biggest drawback for Bulawayo has been having a council and parliamentarians who are not connected to Government at any given time. Much as people have the right to choose who they want to be their leader, it is pointless to choose a person who is helpless. Choosing people who are not part of Government and cannot influence policy in favour of their areas will not help Bulawayo and the entire Matabeleland region.

"If Zanu-PF manages to recapture all the five seats in the by-election I feel it will help reconnect Bulawayo to Government and reconnect people from this part of the country to Government. It would benefit the province and the rest of the region if Zanu-PF was to recapture those seats," he said.

Five seats, namely Makokoba, Luveve, Pelandaba-Mpopoma, Pumula and Lobengula are up for grabs in Bulawayo. Cdes Tshinga Dube, Ntandoyenkosi Mlilo, Joseph Tshuma, Godfrey Malaba and Maidei Mpala will be representing the Zanu-PF party in the five constituencies respectively.

Added Mr Mhlanga: "I think this is the time that people should stop and think before they vote. It would be bad news for politics if Zanu-PF dominates politics, but I think it would be good for development to have MPs that speak the same language as Government. People should vote for people who connect to national resources and use them to develop their areas and that person must have a relationship with the ruling Government."

Another political analyst Dr Lawton Hikwa concurred saying reclaiming of Bulawayo parliamentary seats by Zanu-PF would help the province derive benefits from national projects.

"Bulawayo has a number of challenges among them the collapse of industry and water shortages. Having Zanu-PF MPs in Bulawayo will bring a fresh outlook to political leadership and may initiate fast movement towards service delivery and resuscitation of local industry," he said.

Bulawayo had traditionally been a protestant constituency, creating room for the opposition to claim dominance, a development that has seen the province lagging behind in terms of development.

The forthcoming June elections are an opportunity for the local electorate to break with tradition and usher in a refreshing era of a leadership connected to Government, leaders who speak the same language with Government and can tap into national resources to develop their constituencies.

Democracy entails one voting for a candidate they want, but development calls for the electorate to choose candidates with the capacity to transform lives.

The ball is in the electorate's court.