Support for MDC is lessening
Social and political commentator, Psychology Maziwisa, suggests that the Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) is taking the support of Zimbabweans for granted, and that they need to reassess their priorities. Here is his latest article:
MDC doesn’t get it
Taking things for granted has for a very long time been the hallmark of African politics and apparently the MDC is no exception.
Over the years Zimbabweans have come to share a common and overwhelming detestation of Mugabe and his selfish mob engendered by repression, extra-judicial killings, torture, mismanagement, self-aggrandisement, plunder and all the rest of it.
When Zimbabweans felt they were being taken for a ride by Mugabe, they very readily and rightly transferred their confidence to the MDC. They did so in the full and fervent belief that their concerns as a people were likely to be much better understood by a government under MDC leadership.
Unfortunately attempts to democratically elect a government in accord with the will of the people have all but failed because Mugabe and ZANU PF are allergic to democracy.
However, when Tsvangirai agreed to share power with Mugabe in 2008 the overwhelming opinion was that, although to share power in circumstances where he clearly was the winner amounted to a travesty of fairness and democracy, his options were limited.
Equally overwhelming was the sense that things would improve for the better – and they have to some extent. However, the improvement has not been fundamental enough to offer a clean break from the past. It has not been enough to restore the dignity of the majority of Zimbabweans.
To be fair to the MDC, the tyrant has not made it, and will never make it, particularly easy for Tsvangirai to bring about reform as quickly and as decisively as he probably would have wanted. That is the simple reality.
But here is another simple reality: anti-MDC sentiment is mounting and it is mounting at a pace so swift that it just may become impossible to contain if people’s support is continually taken for granted.
While support for the MDC abroad may still be intact, in Zimbabwe it is falling to pieces.
The reckless regard for Tsvangirai and the MDC as political saints and, to the extent that reform has not been as smooth as it could be, as victims, is misplaced.
The fact of the matter is that, almost two years into the arrangement, Tsvangirai is still very much a part of it- clear evidence that despite its imperfection, there is some kind of understanding between the parties in government.
When that government fails it is not just Mugabe that fails, Tsvangirai and Mugabe necessarily fail together.
For their part, Tsvangirai and the MDC have not done enough to deal decisively with real issues such as teachers’ salaries, tertiary education, media reform, inhuman prison conditions, poverty and disease.
Annoyingly the explanation usually given in response to questions about why, two years on, not much has been done, is simply that government has no money.
It was the MDC’s Tendai Biti who approved an expenditure of over R100 million per semester for the education of Zimbabwean students at South African Universities, most of whom are the offspring of the political elite of this country. (Bear in mind there are two semesters in an academic year and an average degree spans three years.)
It was the MDC’s Tendai Biti who just recently disbursed an estimated US$6.3 million to the Information and Technology Ministry headed by Nelson Chamisa.
While up-to-date communications and information technology (CIT) is vital in the modern world, it is not a top priority for Zimbabwe right now.
It boggles the mind, therefore, how and why that kind of money could be made available for those purposes when the country’s constitution-making process has been stalled because the government is failing to make good on its obligation to fully provide the US$8 million required for the process to get under way.
Chamisa wants millions of dollars to revive the ‘veins and arteries’ of communication. An estimated 2 million of our people will need food aid by the end of this year and all he cares about is revive the ‘veins and arteries’ of communication! Who is going to revive the veins and arteries of our starving people?
What the hell is wrong with these people? What is needed is decisive action on the real issues and not on self-serving agendas.
Despite the ignominy our dear old dictator heaps on the United States, Hillary Clinton recently revealed that her country pledges US$300 million each year in aid to our government. $US300 million per year is not enough to bail Zimbabwe out of its economic crisis but it is a lot of money nonetheless. And since Tsvangirai and the MDC have been in government for over a year they are just as accountable for it as Mugabe is. Where is that money?
When Zimbabweans insist on more being done even as they are aware that the country has no money- thanks to individuals who are pocketing the proceeds of Chiadzwa and several other mines and companies- they do so not because they are naive. It is because they believe that more time could be spent on pleading for aid and less, if any at all, on calling for the removal of targeted sanctions.
It is because they believe that more time could be spent on making sure that all the proceeds of our natural resources are used for the sole purpose of benefiting the country and less, if any at all, on harvesting blows at Harvest House.
That is what a serious government does. It is what the MDC is failing to do as a partner in the unity government.
There is much more to Tsvangirai and the MDC’s task in the unity government than to always and ineffectually declare anything and everything ‘null and void’.
It is their task, among other things, to bring about political reform. It is their task to plead with the donor community to put ideology aside, to open their hearts and help the people of Zimbabwe in every way possible. That is not happening right now. If it is, it is not being pursued vigorously and effectively.
Zimbabweans invested so much hope and expectation in the MDC yet today there is little to show for it. To date there remains a deep-seated, underlying economic anxiety in our country. That is why teachers are increasingly threatening to go on a nationwide strike. It is precisely why the Zimbabwe Congress of Trade Unions (ZCTU) is becoming increasingly critical of the MDC.
Many are now of the justified view that the MDC is losing sight of what it is fighting for in the struggle against ZANU PF.
That struggle, they correctly argue, is about putting the needs of people before claiming and clinging to leadership positions.
It is about guarding against treating teachers as cheap labour.
It is about ensuring that university students throughout the country are able to study in well–resourced colleges- more particularly, that they can sit for their exams without fear of being barred because of unpaid tuition.
It is about ensuring that thousands of precious children do not die needlessly every year from preventable diseases.
That is what the struggle is all about. Sadly these hopes and expectations are not being realized even with the MDC as part of government.
The MDC is really going to need to pull something special out of the bag to renew their covenant with the people.
No party can claim to have an absolute monopoly over the politics of our country. Not ZANU PF. Not the MDC. If the MDC continues to take the support of the people for granted, it does so at its own peril.
They can no longer continue to circumvent the ever loud and clear calls for swift, tangible and decisive action without serious consequences for the image and support base of their party.