Because of the importance of elections, people must be given enough space, freedom and information to make decisions and cast their vote.
Elections are important to any nation, that is why in some countries, like Australia, Brazil, Belgium and Argentina, it is a crime not to vote.
In other countries, elections are an event to celebrate since elections are a renewal of people’s mandate.
The politician is given a directive while the voter stakes a claim on a candidate. It is a symbiotic relationship that benefits both.
The United States of America just held their mid-term elections and voters threw out many rascals from both parties.
In the process, they sent a clear message to their president, Barack Obama, that he better work harder.
How quaint!
Zimbabwe is likely to hold elections next year and, as expected, they are already not free and fair!
Connoisseurs of murder, mayhem and violence, can now take out their notebooks and pens to start recording the dead.
We are going to see a re-run of the 2008 elections in which we lost more than 200 of our compatriots at the hands of Robert Mugabe’s ZANU-PF.
But this time, ZANU-PF perpetrators of violence are cleverer and well prepared, unlike last time when the voters caught them by surprise.
We can only wish for what Americans take for granted: the opportunity to freely choose our own leaders and representatives, without fear of attack or death.
So much is going against us in Zimbabwe, starting with those who lead us.
Our leaders have no respect for the constitution.
Morgan Tsvangirai became Prime Minister after breaking his party’s constitution, leaving me wondering how someone who has so little respect for his own party’s constitution can uphold the constitution of Zimbabwe.
Mugabe has never had any need for the constitution and he has shown his contempt for the constitution from the very beginning.
His favourite part in the constitution is one dealing with Presidential powers, allowing him to rule by decree.
Now these two have come together and have agreed to hold elections next year yet both of them know that the nation and the people are just not ready for this all important exercise.
What are they up to?
What deals have they concluded between themselves?
Why is the MDC not resisting what ZANU-PF does, even in the face of violence against its own supporters?
I dare say it is a devilish show time in Zimbabwe.
Mugabe is about to teach Tsvangirai a lesson in political deviousness; unfortunately, that lesson comes with body bags.
Mugabe and Tsvangirai want elections next year, yet nothing on the ground augers well for such plebiscite.
Even the constitutional outreach programme was mired in violence.
Elections under prevailing conditions will produce bickering, uncertainty and in fighting. It will produce another coalition government, which would suit Mugabe fine by offering an excuse for him to stay where he is.
But why did the MDC accept elections under prevailing conditions and without even bothering to deal with the issue of voters’ protection?
How can they expect people to continue putting their lives in danger when the MDC itself shows little concern over their safety?
The MDC is addressing many “illegal rallies” right now since the rallies are not always sanctioned by the government.
Shouldn’t the MDC have made noises concerning the removal of draconian laws to leave itself and the people free to campaign for a government of their choice?
Public media, including radio and television, exist for the glorification of Mugabe and ZANU-PF and always portray Tsvangirai and the MDC negatively.
There is absolutely nothing the MDC can point at as good reason to accept elections at this moment.
Very soon the MDC will start whimpering and complaining about ZANU-PF and elections yet they are willingly walking into this mess with their eyes wide open.
The voters’ roll, truly a work of fiction, contains names of people who died as far back as 1980 and most of these grateful dead have been voting for ZANU-PF since their demise decades ago.
Yet today living people, especially those who do not support ZANU-PF, cannot find their names on the voters’ roll.
The MDC has always complained about this but suddenly now it doesn’t matter to them.
The MDC trumpets the need for election observers but what good are election observers if the elections are based on skewed and faulty conditions?
Granted, Zimbabwe desperately needs elections to rid itself of a coalition government.
One party in government, be it ZANU-PF or the MDC, is preferable to the kind of rubbish the nation has been subjected to through the unity government.
With one party in government, we at least know who our enemy is. Because of this coalition government, we cannot get to ZANU-PF because it is being protected by the MDC.
We cannot get to the MDC because it blames its shortcomings on ZANU-PF.
Something funny is going on here!
The MDC agrees to fresh elections at a time when all the odds are staked against the voters.
People’s lives are on the line and Mugabe has never hesitated to snuff out a life here and there to prolong his own.
What really is the MDC up to?
Not long ago, the MDC made a lot of noise because they were themselves the victims. Now, blue has turned to gray; only the people remain as victims while the MDC continues to make endless concessions to ZANU-PF.
How are outsiders supposed to assist us during elections when the MDC invites them to come and monitor a game whose rules are only known to ZANU-PF and whose rules the MDC itself does not know?
By what rules will the international community judge these elections since they do not even meet SADC’s rudimentary rules of holding a free, fair and democratic election?
Tsvangirai will cry to SADC, the UN, the EU and all others about the elections into which he is entering against conventional wisdom.
The MDC must instead start campaigning for a level playfield.
They must demand it from South Africa, SADC, the EU, the UN and from everywhere else where the vote and people’s lives can be protected.
The MDC is not free to hold rallies across the country.
The media is not free to go about its work.
The voters’ roll is not in order by any stretch of the imagination.
State sponsored violence is picking up against MDC supporters.
And the MDC wants elections under such conditions?
In a recent report, the Zimbabwe Peace Project said “human rights conditions in the country remain volatile with a rising number of reports in September directly linked to actions by agents of the state security apparatus”.
The ZPP, a non-governmental organization, said it recorded “more than 800 cases of political and human rights abuses, mainly by militants of Mugabe’s ZANU-PF party against members of Tsvangirai’s MDC”, adding that most of the incidents occurred during the just-completed constitutional revision public outreach process.
The NGO said these violent acts “were concentrated in Mashonaland East, Central and West Provinces, in eastern Manicaland Province and in central Midlands Province ”.
That’s five provinces, with a population of more than half of Zimbabwe right there!
And this is something the MDC can ignore?
It might be just the right time to throw all the rascals out.
