MDC-T leader and his arch-nemesis MDC Alliance spokesperson Fadzayi Mahere were yesterday embroiled in a social media tiff following the former’s remarks that he intends to change the political dynamics in Zimbabwe.
Mwonzora, since his unceremonious departure from the Nelson Chamisa-led MDC Alliance, has been taking salvos from the leading opposition movement’s supporters and its top brass who accuse him of supping with the ruling party, Zanu-PF, and selling out their “struggle”.
The big tussle emanates from March 2019 when High Court judge Justice Edith Mushore nullified Chamisa’s MDC-T presidency and ordered the party to organize an extraordinary congress to choose a new leader within a month.
But the youthful leader pressed ahead with his party’s planned political activities since then pending his appeal against the judgment, which he again lost at the Supreme Court.
In a tweet post yesterday evening, Mwonzora said he is ready to move Zimbabwe from politics of hate while ushering in the politics of tolerance.
“We will change the politics of Zimbabwe. We say no to violence, rancor, hate, and bitterness. We are for rational disputation and tolerance,” Mwonzora said.
This was before Mahere shot him down saying he is scared of elections and has no mandate to speak on behalf of the people.
“How can you change anything when you’re scared of elections? Where does your mandate come from? Who do you represent? What’s rational about seeking to ban elections?
We say no to a political culture that excludes the people,” Mahere retorted.
The two MDCs have been embroiled in a tug of war over the use of the party’s name, which prompted the Zimbabwe Electoral Commission (ZEC) to declare that it would only allow the MDC faction that will file its nomination papers first to use the MDC Alliance name as the issue could only be solved through a first-come-first-serve basis.
“If I have already received a symbol, say a maize cob, from one political party as a presiding officer then I will not accept the same symbol from another candidate from a different party,” ZEC Director of elections and training Japhet Murenje told journalists at an elections workshop in Chinhoyi recently.
Murenje said ZEC was not really worried about the names of the parties, adding that they pay more attention to party symbols.
“A party’s name might have the same abbreviations which mean totally different things, and so we look at the symbols and we then say since we have already received a symbol similar to this one, we can’t take yours,” he said
