“Chamisa embodies the aspirations of born-frees.
“That he narrowly lost to President Emmerson Mnangagwa in the 2018 elections means a lot to us young people. He dared us to dream.”
This is typical of people who are confused and/or whose understanding of the issues are so narrow and vague what they say does not make any sense.
Chamisa’s Constitutional Court challenge of the 2018 presidential election results were based on premise that he had won 2.6 million votes and the MDC A supporters rallied behind him. He failed to produce all V11 forms, the piece of paper giving vote count for each candidate issued by each Polling Station, to show where he got that figure; but that was inconsequential to the MDC A wildebeest herd.
ZEC declared that Mnangagwa got 2.4 million votes and Chamisa got 2.2 million votes. ZEC admitted in its affidavit to the Constitution Court that it too did not have all the V11 forms; it 10 987 V11 forms and about 10% were missing; hence the reason ZEC had third different vote tallies it could not reconcile.
V11 forms are supposed to be completed and signed by ZEC officials in the presence of all the contestants or their agents who will add their signature as the witnesses to the voting process. One copy of the V11 is posted at each Polling Station.
A second copy of the V11 is retained in the ballot box together with the ballots and all the other materials used in the voting process. The ballot box is then sealed and ZEC officials and the witness will all attach their signatures.
A third copy of the V11 is kept by the ZEC officials for use in the next stage of the counting process. This is the copy ZEC command centre received. If, for whatever reason, the V11 form to ZEC command centre was lost, then the vote count from the affected Polling Station would not be included in the vote count until the sealed ballot box was opened. For ZEC to miss over 1 000 V11 forms and to have the votes from these missing V11 added to the total count regardless; should have set-off alarm bells ringing non-stop – this cannot be a free, fair and credible elections.
The failure to produce V11 was not the only cause for alarm. 3 million Zimbabweans in the diaspora were denied the vote. During his visit to the USA for the Heads of State and Government annual UN meeting in September 2018, Mnangagwa promised Zimbabweans in the diaspora will vote in future. He did not give any reasons why they had been denied the vote in the past because there was no excuse.
Indeed, ZEC had failed to produce something as basic as a verified voters’ roll, both a legal and common-sense requirement. Without a verified voters’ roll the opportunities to rig the vote are limitless.
By participating in these flawed and illegal elections, MDC A was giving credibility to the process and by extension giving legitimacy to the vote rigging Zanu PF regime.
What is really infuriating about it all is that MDC A leaders themselves knew their participating was giving legitimacy to the vote rigging Zanu PF as David Coltart readily admitted in his book.
In his Book, The Struggle Continues 50 years of Tyranny in Zimbabwe, David Coltart, former MDC – Ncube and Minister of Education in the 2008 GNU, gave details of how Zanu PF was flouting the electoral rules in the upcoming 2013 elections. It was clear the elections were not be free, fair and credible and yet he and everyone else soldiered on.
“The worst aspect for me about the failure to agree a coalition was that both MDCs couldn’t now do the obvious – withdraw from the elections,” wrote Senator Coltart.
“The electoral process was so flawed, so illegal, that the only logical step was to withdraw, which would compel SADC to hold Zanu PF to account. But such was the distrust between the MDC-T and MDC-N that neither could withdraw for fear that the other would remain in the elections, winning seats and giving the process credibility.”
A feeble excuse because three of the main MDC factions plus four other opposition parties formed the MDC A coalition and still there was no talk of boycotting the 2018 elections. They were all after the few gravy train seats and greed prevailed.
“MDC A has stringent measures to stop Zanu PF rigging the elections!” Chamisa’s feeble excuse for participating in elections knowing Zanu PF was rigging.
MDC A are gearing to participate in the 2023 elections with not even a token reform in place. The leaders are talking of devising “Winning In Rigged Elections (WIRE) strategies”. All nonsense, of course. Without something as basic as a verified voters’ roll the really is no limit to what one can do to rig the vote.
What Zimbabwe needs desperately right now is clear minded people who will discard these WIRE strategies with the contempt they rightly deserve and demand the nation focus on implementing all the reforms to ensure free, fair and credible elections.
We can rule out Zanu PF implementing any reforms before 2023, especially when the party knows MDC A and the rest in the opposition will participate with no reforms. What Zanu PF should know here and now is that if the elections go ahead with no reforms the process will be declared null and void, regardless of Chamisa et al participating in the flawed elections. Enough of this nonsense of elections with no verified voters’ roll, millions denied the vote, etc.
Zimbabwe must never again be bamboozled by Mnangagwa, Chamisa or anyone into yet another flawed and illegal election process and allow the result to stand! The nation has made this foolish mistake these last 41 years and it will be insane to repeat the same mistake again!
