As we approach the home run in the final stretch of the 2013 harmonized elections the talk of a grand coalition among political parties will just lead us to another blame game in the face of defeat. Looking back at how the two MDC parties have worked together in the inclusive government will tell you the that the relation wasn’t rosy at all so efforts to forge an alliance at this ninth hour are just futile. The only time these two parties teamed up was during the election of Speaker of Parliament and after the relationship went sour especially when then Ncube faction was embroiled in its own succession battle with the then leader Arthur Mutambara. Legislators from MDC-N were expelled from the party faction when they crossed floor to join Mr Tsvangirai’s faction. We later heard reports of the leaders of the unity government teaming up together and having closed door meetings singling out Welshman. In Maputo a grandstanding was staged at an SADC meeting when Tsvangirai and Ncube tried to humiliate President Robert Mugabe.

Just when people thought that the relationship had normalized the two leaders started their election campaigns by trading insults at each other, with Tsvangirai boasting of a huge support calling Ncube a village politician bent on peddling tribal politics. This tirade has turned out to be like a “dissing” contest at a rap concert. The lack of tangible policies in this year’s campaign is a clear sign of how politicians are trying to fill gaps in election manifestos with insults. If we are going to elect a leader should we base that on how eloquently the candidate disrespects opponents like a recent campaign advert I heard on radio about Tsvangirai’s sex life which is being peddled by ZANU-PF.

The Research and Advocacy Unit, “outlawed” yesterday from holding a public voter’s roll audit says an eye-popping 2 million Zimbabweans failed to have names included on the voter’s roll during the voter registration exercise, while another 1 million mysterious names appear in the register.

A young man doing some degree at the Chinhoyi University of Technology told me the other day he went along with his dad to register, and when they got to the queue they were given “tickets” with numbers apparently to ensure no wise guys jumped the queue.

But the young man complained that while his dad was given a ticket numbered 220, he was given one numbered 651, never mind that he was standing behind his dad!

He thought it was a bad joke and now he finds himself missing his democratic right to vote!

He is certainly one of many of the 2 million RAU says will not vote despite being eligible, and as Tsvangirai has said, no matter who wins, this election will not be legitimate.

How can it be when many people will not be able to vote, not because they have lost faith in the whole process of elections being the only way to determine their future, but because the system literally shut them out.

I am asked all the time (but I probably ask it just as often), “What is going to happen with the elections?” Short answer, “I don’t know, I don’t have a crystal ball, if I did, I would have more money than I do now!”

It is an interesting question, even though the result will be the same as it was last elections. Zanu PF will lose the elections, but will not lose power. MDC will win the elections, but will not take power.

Consider, 2008. End result, MDC is the largest group in parliament. Most MPs. Most seats. Most constituencies. But do they start calling themselves the “ruling party”? Do they repeal POSA in their five years as the ruling party (or repeal any laws)? Do they rule? We are a parliamentary democracy, Zimbabwe is legally ruled by parliament.

Presidential election – disputed. But the MDC’s candidate wins that, not by, but they still won. Why do they allow the losing party’ s candidate to remain at his former post? But either way, why is the former ruling party, and it’s Presidential candidate still regarded as the “ruling party”? Why does the real “ruling party” not rule?

So my prediction for 1 August 2013: Zanu PF will lose the elections, but will not lose power.

What would be really interesting – if the MDC (or anyone but the former ruling party) took a massive election victory. How would the current regime hold on to power? We know they will, but how?

It’s always fascinating trying to understand why people choose to vote for a particular party, and as the political rallies hot up with Mugabe scaling down his itinerary, political party colours have become vogue, never mind that some wear these T-shirts emblazoned with party leader effigies for reasons that have nothing to do with political affiliation but everything to do with the area they find themselves in.

But it is another thing altogether to get convincing responses concerning how one arrives at choosing the political party to support.

I sat with two young men over the weekend who were preparing to go to an MDC-T rally somewhere in the capital.

They proudly wore the party colours and were literally fired up for the occasion. Opposite them sat another young man who wore a Zanu PF cap that bears the image of Robert Mugabe.

And then the two young men felt compelled to pour out to me why they were so passionate about the party they had chosen to support.

I was told one was a pharmacist, while the other said he had done some management degree at the University of Zimbabwe.

“Look at me my brother, I am wearing my younger brother’s jeans because he has more money than me but I am more educated than him,” one of them with the UZ education said. I looked at him and indeed the pair of jeans was that kind of tight fit with “borrowed” written all over them!

“For me, the MDC-T is the only party that might give me a chance to get the job I trained for. Look at this guy, he is a pharmacist but works at a supermarket,” he said referring to his colleague.

And the colleague went into a long tirade about his circumstances, why he felt Zanu PF had outlived its usefulness, if it ever had any.

These were two angry young men for whom the future of the country rests in new ideas that will spring them from their misery despite all the education they boast.

The other chap wearing the Zanu PF cap seemed amused and had no input whatsoever, but then it turns out these are chaps from the same neighbourhood for whom tolerance of divergent political views perhaps comes naturally.

As we sat, along came this other guy who told a third older man that there was a Zanu PF rally across the road, “why don’t you come along?”

The older man responded, “look who I am sitting with,” pointing at the red T-shirts the young men were wearing. “You should join us instead. Why are you going to the Zanu PF rally in the first place?”

I saw the chap blush and he responded: “Ah, ndinongondzwa chiyifarira.”

And that was the end of it.

It got me thinking about all the manifestos that the parties have put out, if at all the ordinary party supporters actually read through them to decide their vote, yet some of the issues that came out from encounters with these young folks were based on the pragmatic, such as the demand for jobs by these two “educated” lads.

That’s why many find it laughable that a party that has been in power for 33 years can today talk about unlocking a USD2 trillion economy.

These become nothing but wild numbers that the new crop of young voters will interrogate and when a guy like Kasukuwere says “we are emancipating our people,” the younger voters laugh and dismiss him as a fraud.

Yet, as everything during elections, politicians will say all sorts of nonsense to woo voters, and what this country certainly needs right now are enlightened voters. But then a corollary of that would be, are there any enlightened political parties?

/It is always sad to come face to face with young people who choose to own other people’s anger and vindictiveness without interrogating the implications of their choices and actions and where such behavior affects the way we are governed and the future of democracy in our country. From Grace Mutandwa’s memoirs, The Power and the Glory/.

The other day, I listened to a kombi driver chat with a female cop and perhaps like everywhere, their banter ended up touching on the coming elections.

“I hear you will be voting earlier than everyone,” the driver said. “Yes,” the cop answered not hiding the excitement of the privilege.

Then the guy complained that he wasn’t going to vote because he had failed to register after being frustrated by the long queues.

Ah yes, the queues were frustrating, the cop agreed.

I sniggered imagining the cop was relishing the moment that a few voters would mean she had her work cut out – literally.

A few voters will certainly mean cops are not kept busy manning long winding queues, but the exchange between the cop and the kombi driver was a conversation that has gained common currency in the run up to the poll, where the question “did you register” has become the favourite topic like the British asking each other about the weather!

And with the MDC-T’s estimates that more than 300,000 people in Harare failed to register, such conversations do give a picture of the magnitude of the very flawed voter registration process.

While the figure offered by the MDC-T might look wild, word on the street does point to worse if read with the disgruntlement that prevails in other parts of the country where old women of Malawian origin for example with metal ID they got before independence were told to bring their birth certificates!

It’s not funny but Zanu PF Svengalis manipulating the electoral processes imagine they will have the last laugh.

In the past five years these two parties have worked together in an inclusive government. More plundering than job creation happened. Now that 31st of July is just three weeks away we are being promised over a million jobs and a growing economy. Going for this election both parties know that youths want jobs so its no wonder there are promises of jobs but some figures are just too good to be true. I had some time today comparing the two parties’ manifestos and here I quote some interesting hopes and dreams.

The 2013 field is set and this year it seems it’s all about JUICE for the players if they are going to score “Bhora Mugedhi”.

MDC-T highlights that,

“The MDC plan is aimed at uplifting all citizens in all corners of the country and will create 1 million jobs by 2018 and a $100 billion economy by 2040.”

27 years of one party rule so that the economy dream is fulfilled? I don’t think so.

In every match coaches battle to come up with strategies to counter opponents and since MDC-T is already attacking, not be outdone ZANU-PF is also on the offensive hoping to score  “Bhora Mugedhi” with 2,265 million jobs in the next five years.

“Creating value of US$7,3 billion from the indigenisation of 1,138 companies across 14 key sectors of the economy and over US$1,844,223,157,000 created from the idle value of empowerment assets unlocked from parastatals, local authorities, mineral rights and claims and from the State.”

There are also promises from Zanu PF for more flea and vendor market stands to be created and houses for low-income earners. And this comes along with revolutionary commitment to address and meet the goals of all Zimbabweans regardless of their social, economic, cultural or ethnic affinity, background or affiliation.

With all this on the table I wonder what strategy the merged team of MDC-N and ZAPU will have to come up with to defeat this leading pack?