Coalition ‘allies’ leave Tsvangirai in the cold? MDC-T leader Mr Morgan Tsvangirai was left in the cold after the allies he was courting nubbed the much hyped grand coalition signing ceremony in Harare. The signing ceremony was hastily cancelled after MDC leader Professor Welshman Ncube and Zapu frontman Dr Dumiso Dabengwa pulled a shocker by announcing a bilateral alliance, excluding Mr Tsvangirai, in Bulawayo. Left with egg on his face, Mr Tsvangirai, together with Mavambo leader Dr Simba Makoni and Zanu Ndonga reject Mr Reketayi Semwayo, then held a closed door meeting with business people and civic society groups in Harare to map the way forward after the Constitutional Court upheld July 31 as the poll date. Sources close to developments, however, said though Prof Ncube and Dr Dabengwa announced their so-called coalition, the move was designed to eke out more concessions from Mr Tsvangirai whose vulnerability they had long ascertained. Sources said the United States was pushing the MDC formations, Zapu and Zanu Ndonga into a coalition to improve their chances against Zanu-PF in the harmonised elections. Washington, worried by the poor electoral chances of the four parties, hatched the plan for the grand alliance and presented it to them, fait accompli, through a neighbouring country sympathetic to some officials of the parties in the coalition. If the deal had succeeded, Mr Tsvangirai would have become the sole presidential candidate, the party’s secretary-general Mr Tendai Biti first vice president, and Prof Ncube the second vice president. The sources said the coalition had been finalised on Thursday, and was due to be simultaneously announced by Mr Tsvangirai and Dr Makoni in Harare, and Prof Ncube and Dr Dabengwa in Bulawayo around mid-day yesterday. This followed a series of shuttle meetings in Harare and Bulawayo by representatives of the neighbouring country running on behalf of the US. But it appeared Prof Ncube’s MDC, which had been reluctant to forge an electoral alliance due to personal political ambitions of the leaders and differing ideologies, scuttled the plan for the so-called grand coalition. The sources said this was despite the parties being “whipped into line” by the US and the neighbouring country, both worried the parties stood little chance of defeating Zanu-PF in the July 31 elections. Several recent surveys have pointed to a Zanu-PF victory in the elections, with voters attracted by the party’s broad-based economic empowerment policies such as land reforms and indigenisation which have transformed the lives of hundreds of thousands of people across the country. The sources said the announcement of the grand coalition had been timed to “lift up the spirits” among the parties following Mr Tsvangirai and Prof Ncube’s failure to delay the poll. The Constitutional Court on Thursday dismissed applications by the two to delay the poll, a judgment which dealt a psychological blow to their parties ahead of the election. The timing was also meant to “steal the thunder” from Zanu-PF’s launch of its election campaign and manifesto at Zimbabwe Grounds in Highfield. Having failed to launch the coaltion yesterday, the MDC-T was reported to have moved its campaign launch from today to Sunday amid reports it was lobbying ZEC to establish a local independent committee to monitor preparations for elections and implement security and media reforms as part of conditions for a free and fair election. Mr Tsvangirai told civic society organisations and the business people that his concern was never about dates but reforms. He cited security and media sectors as some of the grey areas that need to be reformed if elections are to be conducted in a free and fair environment. Mavambo leader Dr Makoni recommended that the MDC-T leadership should alert Sadc, the African Union and other observer mission teams that the environment is not level so as to avoid “flawed” elections. The parties also claimed that voter registration was slow even though among its last acts, the Parliamentary Portfolio Committee on Defence and Home Affairs endorsed the process. ZEC chairperson Justice Rita Makarau said more teams had already been added in the capital to speed up the mobile registration exercise. So far, around half a million new voters have been registered under the mobile voter registration exercise, bringing the total number of registered voters to six million. MDC deputy spokesperson Mr Kuraone Chihwayi said MDC-T had approached them for the coalition with dirty hands. He said MDC-T wanted to use them for the purposes of extorting money from the international community. “They (MDC-T) wanted to use us forgetting that we are a big and serious party that cannot be used by (Morgan) Tsvangirai,” he said. “They are not an honest lot and they wanted to use us for the purposes of extorting money from the international community. A serious negotiator does not come with conditions and a position to the negotiating table.” “They (MDC-T) wanted us to back Tsvangirai and donate our votes to him. Professor Ncube is not a habitual sellout who can betray his supporters like that.” Mr Tsvangirai is desperate to engineer a coalition with other political parties to unseat Zanu-PF. The MDC-T leader appears to have realised that his chances of winning the next elections are slim following his love shenanigans that left his character as a national leader battered. Mr Chihwayi said it was wrong for anyone to think that Mr Tsvangirai was a God given leader and should be the leader of any proposed coalition. He accused MDC-T of staging coalitions in the media saying Zimbabwe could not afford to have a blunt leader such as Mr Tsvangirai.
Posted on: Sat, 06 Jul 2013 13:32:52 +0000
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