Fresh Election Not An Answer To Zim Political Woes

“The difficult we have is that we have political gladiators understandably who are more preoccupied with proving to the nation who has less fear for the elections than the other. They have all these macho-mentality when all objective indicators show that it’s not in the national interest to talk about election or even talk about it when you have not even completed the constitution making process,”said Ncube when he gave a keynote address at a one day broadcasting conference in Harare.

“Any election called by Mugabe in anger can not be anything other than a Zanu (PF) victory. It will take us back to June 2008. I don’t understand why some people think they will agree with Mugabe on a big thing like elections when they can’t agree on small things like the
appointment of the Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe (RBZ) Governor,” said Ncube in a veiled attack to his colleagues in the MDC who seem to have pandered to Mugabe’s idea of an early election.

Ncube also lashed at Zimbabwe’s Information and Publicity Ministry for its continued failure to licence private broadcasters in Zimbabwe despite that it is provided for in the GPA.

“Regrettable that enthusiasm does not appear to exist. We have a situation where even though the legal framework permits..we still have no movement and are unlikely to have movement particularly now that for one reason or another we are slowly retreating as political parties to our political mode trenches,” said Ncube.

“The moment we are in those trenches it is extremely unlike to have effective reform. That is why some of us continue to think that it is a mistake for any of the parties to begin to talk of elections.”

Ncube who is one of the negotiators of the the Global Political Agreement (GPA) admitted that together with his colleagues who negotiated on behalf of the larger MDC party, they did not do a good job to ensure that the broadcasting media like the print media is managed by an independent constitutional body.

“In the principal negotiations we did not thoroughly address the implications of regulating the broadcasting section of the media whereas in respect of the print media we created the constitutional body the Zimbabwe Media Commission (ZMC) which could act independently without the interference of the minister or government of the day regrettable we did not do that in respect of the media, maybe we were tired,” said Ncube.

He said the GPA had failed because politcians were preoccupying themselves with securing key posts for party loyalists at the expense of key democratic reforms.

“The issues over which we are in constant disagreement are issues which are not at the foundation of democratic reform or governance,” he said.

He said parties must focus on bringing about key institutional reforms such as the electoral, broadcasting and security sectors as opposed to fighting over posts.

Ncube said both Zanu (PF) and the MDC led by Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai were overestimating their popularity and risked electoral humiliation come elections.

“None of the macho people who are constantly threatening us with this election are guaranteed of victory. Virtually none of them,” he said. “When you dare each other it’s quite dangerous and you tend to over estimate your strength.”

Zimbabwe is set to call for fresh polls in June next year according to President Robert Mugabe. He said he does not want the two year inclusive government to be extended.