by Dr R Simangaliso Kumalo, Director of Research and Postgraduate Studies, School of Religion, Philosophy and Classics, University of KwaZulu-Natal
To a number of freedom-loving people, the results of the elections in Zimbabwe have been, to say the least, a disappointment. Many Africans were hoping for change to take place in that country. With the ruling party winning with an outright majority, many people have lost hope for the development of Zimbabwe. It is important to highlight the reasons for the disappointment.
Leadership change
One of the key principles of democracy is that it grants change of leadership from one person to another so that the nation can always get the best minds available to lead them at a particular stage in the life of a country. There is a lot to be said for the sharing of the leadership stage. Unfortunately for Zimbabwe, it looks like a chance to have new blood and fresh ideas to take the country forward has just been missed.
African people’s debts to movements of liberation
Another disturbing trend that can be gleaned from these elections is that it looks like in many parts of Africa, people are forever indebted to the movement that emerged as the main liberating party during independence. It becomes difficult for these movements to allow democracy to prevail and other movements to play key leadership roles. Newcomers are vilified as opportunists with no credentials from the struggle for liberation. The ruling party then clings to power as if they have an ordained right to rule.
Hatred of the opposition
Following on the previous point, another unfortunate element is the hatred for the opposition. I know of no other African country where the opposition is respected as a party of credible leaders with a different manifesto and sense of how the country should be governed. It has become acceptable for people to vilify and even persecute the opposition by deciding voting dates unilaterally, depriving the opposition of resources to run their election campaigns. This happens not just in Zimbabwe but in many parts of the continent. Politics has become not just a dirty game but an ugly one, too. The MDC not only came out bruised in these elections, but they were also seriously wounded by this battle. This is in spite of the fact that when they joined the government of national unity, they transformed life in the country.
There was no fuel, no food on the shelves, schools were closed, etc., but the MDC made sure that all those things were brought back. The question is how could the people not have seen and appreciated these achievements? Is it enough to say that they lost because the votes were rigged? Is it also not true that in spite of its failures a large number of Zimbabweans still voted for the ruling party? The answer is that they did. The question is how on earth could they have done that. One of the answers to that question is that many people vote on ethnic lines, which can result in serious setbacks for democracy in Africa. (Of course, this happens in many parts of Africa, but evidence from the U.S. and Europe shows that it is not unique to the continent and should therefore not be thought of as an “African problem.”)
Morgan Tsvangirai and the MDC
I must also say that I do not think that the MDC are without blame here. They also have to take responsibility for this terrible setback. From the time the MDC agreed to join the government of national unity, it lost an opportunity to give the last push to a government that was about to collapse. It is my understanding that, at that time, the ZANU-PF government was not going to hold for much longer; almost everything was collapsing around it. But when MDC joined them, they brought some level of credibility to ZANU_PF, and that gave them a new lease on life. Unfortunately, ZANU-PF did not use the government of national unity to rebuild its credibility by working hand in hand with the MDC. They just continued to undermine them. So the MDC spent its time trying to validate themselves and fight off the ZANU-PF’s tactics, instead of moving forward as a party and developing allies in civil society.