Prof Madhuku whose National Constitutional Assembly (NCA) is a member of POLAD, said he was not in the same league as Chamisa, who still had a long way to go in the country’s struggle for democracy.
“Chamisa has never had any running battles with the police. I’ve never seen him leading a demonstration. I want to make it clear; I am not in the same league with Chamisa. (Late MDC leader, Morgan) Tsvangirai is not in the same league with Chamisa. Chamisa is not in our league. We led demonstrations, we led the struggle for democratisation here in the most dangerous phase of our development as a country,” Prof Madhuku said.
Prof Madhuku argued that receiving votes was not an indicator of one`s ability to lead the struggle.
“You don’t say that because you have so many million votes, then you necessarily are leading a struggle, that is not the case. Chamisa still has a long way to go to reach the amount of sacrifice that we have given ourselves in terms of the struggle. That’s my understanding of where we have come from, he is actually a beneficiary of the clearance that we have made to the democratisation path. He came by a coup and took leadership of the MDC and that’s a world of difference,” said the NCA leader
In response, Chamisa speaking through his spokesperson, Dr Nkululeko Sibanda, hit back saying POLAD had failed to produce effective policies that could turn around the economy.
“Prof Madhuku has funny shaped ideas and had chosen to hide his head in the sand. He joined POLAD and also hid behind (President) Mnangagwa and people are now feeling the menace of experiencing the ugly sight of their ideas (sic).”
The idea of a national political dialogue after elections is to avert and minimise disaster, said Dr Sibanda who quipped that under the POLAD, the economy continued deteriorating.
“The economy continues worsening, it is not responding to POLAD because it is a dead horse. I am a student of politics and understand that dialogue is supposed to improve a situation but, in this case, the economy is not improving because their ideas are funny shaped,” he said.
Dr Sibanda noted that Chamisa had received two million votes, which was a “show of faith in him, therefore he had no time or business to spend in making silly ideas.”
“Firstly, Prof Madhuku did not win any amount of votes (during the 2018 elections) as people understand that his ideas are funny shaped and people came to realise that. POLAD cannot work, Zimbabweans are clear about that, SADC has been clear about that and the economy is clear about that as well,” said Chamisa’s spokesperson.