THE Douglas Mwonzora led MDC-T says it respects the decision by Last Maengahama and Tungamirai Madzokere to align themselves with the rival MDC Alliance faction following the pair’s recent release from prison.
The activists spent nearly 10 years of an initial 20-year jail sentence for allegedly participating in the gang murder of a senior police officer in Harare’s Glen View suburb May 2011.
The two were convicted together with now MDC-T MP, Yvonne Musarurwa, who got released on parole 2018.
However, soon after their release, Maengahama and Madzokere did not take time to agonise as to which party faction to align with, as all pointed to a Mwonzora snub by the pair.
But in an interview, MDC-T spokesperson Witness Dube said the MDC faction respected the ex-inmate’s political choices.
Dube added that the two MDCs were in fact taking steps to mend bridges.
“The MDC family is one,” Dube said.
“We respect the choices by Maengahama and Madzokere to go with the Chamisa group because we are patently one family struggling to heal our rifts because of differences which were orchestrated and perpetuated by the same Zanu PF that wasted 10 years of their lives.”
Mwonzora’s party said it also did its part to support the two activists in one form or another during their “unlawful” eight-year detention at Chikurubi Maximum Prison, Harare.
“The MDC-T, like all in the MDC family, has given these gentlemen solidarity the best way we could under the circumstances, but nothing we did can ever compensate them for the injustice they suffered at the hands of Zanu PF,” he said.
MDC Alliance deputy spokesperson Clifford Hlatshwayo said the activists joined the Chamisa camp to confirm their allegiance to late founding party leader Morgan Tsvangirai’s one-time vision of a single MDC.
“Madzokere and Maengahama believe in our departed father Morgan Tsvangirai’s vision of one MDC,” said Hlatshwayo.
“They appreciate President Nelson Chamisa as the legitimate MDC Alliance leader who has the capacity to sustain the MDC Alliance as a party.”
Hlatshwayo denied any prospects of MDC Alliance ever working with Mwonzora saying the Nyanga North senator was Zanu PF.
“We don’t work with Zanu PF,” he said.
“Mwonzora is Zanu PF. We will never work with him. Working with Mwonzora will be a betrayal to the people of Zimbabwe.”
