Tsvangirai's final battle

To the spiritually inclined, no offence intended here, who always hunker for miracles even where common sense ought to prevail and will regress to their respective religions when faced with supposedly insurmountable challenges, Emmanuel Makandiwa's prophesy about a future opposition leader emerging not from the local circus but rather from the diaspora, could not have come at a more opportune time.

In a sermon, Makandiwa told his congregants that he was "seeing a person coming from outside, who was running towards the people of Zimbabwe. This person is running in the opposite direction to people, who are running towards him, I see a spider and this spider is following this person, who is the chosen one to lead the people," he said adding that if that person was to join an opposition political party when he returns to Zimbabwe, he would be the country's next leader.

Not so, however, for local opposition apparatchiks. Take for instance Morgan Tsvangirai. This is a man who has spent almost two decades of his life as an opposition leader, whose clutch at the national presidency has been so near his fingertips as to leave a lasting yearn for a full grasp and yet so far away as to be a mirage, and is the most likely not to take lightly this seemingly purposeless disparage. This explains his predictable retort when he said, ""I don't know who goes to n'angas (traditional healers) and prophets, but I don't rely on that. I have a responsibility. God has created me for a purpose and if that purpose is not to be president of the country, that's fine. Whether there are prophecies, I think it's immaterial, as far as I am concerned. Who knows, you can wake up one morning dead (sic), and you say, I prophesied that you won't be president, when you are dead (sic)," said Tsvangirai.

This is not the first time he has scorned prophesies by, yes you guessed right, Makandiwa. In 2014, Tsvangirai vowed to press ahead with street protests to force ouster of ZANU PF and President Mugabe from power against the advice of the UFIC founder who had foreseen bloodshed. True to form, the protest was marred by anarchy as it was hijacked by vandals, thieves and political errants with criminal fantasies. "I am a Christian who respects men of God, but unfortunately, I do not make political judgements or decisions based on prophesy," he said.

Moreover, Tsvangirai is not getting any younger and will feel hard done by his recent diagnosis with cancer of the colon at a time when young turks in the party are openly eyeing his post with the brutal frankness of vultures patiently bidding their time before a frenzied picking of the carcase of a fallen beast. His latest appointment, albeit illegally, of two vice presidents to deputise a vice president to a president have not endeared him to most within his party. To the unenlightened, this might appear like come uppance for commissions and omissions that have seen the party split not once or twice but more. However, to the discerning, the MDC-T leader is a hostage of his own ego and those around him have realised the uncertainty of their tenure, hence the deliberate pen that has been elaborately established to warehouse him pending the outcome of his chemotherapy treatment. Contrary to vultures in the opposition circles, it is a genuine hope that this is one battle that he has to fight and win! So much about the man.

As for Johnny come late Joice Mujuru, no comment. Seriously, barely three years compared with almost twenty years does not merit a comment. To Evan Mawarire who has conveniently sought refuge in Mzansi, most likely in an attempt to fulfil the prophesy, should just return home because if he makes a habit of eloping to neighbours' homes each time the urge is irresistible, his wife will elope also.  

Enter Tendai Biti, who has long viewed himself as deserving of the presidency, with his short stint in the unity government having massaged his ego so much that he split from the man that ushered him into opposition politics at the slightest of differences.  Now that he has been invited by USA presidential hopeful to attend what has turned out to be a chaotic Democrats National Convention in that country, some may feel that the cat is out of the bag and the prophesy has become meaningless.

Hold your horses! Biti may have taken advantage of the invite to also have doctors attend to his medical condition which he is yet to disclose, unlike Tsvangirai. Moreover, some may argue that American political administrators have been known to bungle more often than not. Remember they dragged Britain to their Middle East war escapade on wrong information and now they are cherry-picking Biti as a future President? Not really because Messrs Biti was a ruse, an object of interest to amuse to delegates and ensure Zimbabwe was, for ulterior purposes, kept in the spotlight just as Donald Trump has done. The topical issue might have been with outgoing USA President Barak Obama and Strive Masiyiwa period.

On 20 July, Masiyiwa met Obama at the White House Summit on Global Development which supposedly brought together "top global experts to talk about the progress that President Obama and his Administration have made possible in energy, food security, global health, good governance, development partnerships and youth initiatives around the world." Masiyiwa is a business mogul, whose vast empire stretches fat and wide just like a spider's web in Makandiwa's prophesy. His contacts that includes locals in the diaspora such as Drs Nkosana Moyo and Mthuli Ncube, among others seems to stand him in good stead as far as the prophesy is concerned.

Mind you, this is not the first time that Strive and Barak have met one-on-one as they did so ten years ago over lunch in Johannesburg, South Africa when Obama was still a Senator and Masiyiwa was part of a small group of African and global leaders who had been assembled by out-going UN Secretary General Kofi Annan to find solutions to address hunger, food security and nutrition in Africa.

Local opposition political parties and their leadership should not seek to delete the message and kill the messenger if it is written in the wind. This country being a democracy, common sense dictates that Zimbabweans are looking practical solutions to the country's challenges and whoever articulates these convincingly, be they local or in the diaspora, could be the president.          

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sambulo vuma <samvumindaba@gmail.com