Time Saul became Paul

The MDC-T leader should realise that by continuing to speak for, and represent the interests of Westerners, he will never be relevant to the aspirations of the majority of Zimbabweans who will reject him in the same way they rejected the alien views and values his party hoped to entrench during the outreach.
The Herald (editorial)
WITH the formation of the inclusive Government, many hoped that by swearing allegiance to serve Zimbabwe and its people, MDC-T leader Mr Morgan Tsvangirai would, like the biblical Saul who saw the light on the way to Damascus to persecute Christians, also have his Damascene transformation that would see him write beautiful chapters in nation-building.

How mistaken we all were as events have since proved that a leopard does not change its spots.

Judging by the goings on in the inclusive Government that have seen Tsvangirai reporting to and consulting Westerners on the business of the inclusive Government; once a Saul, always a Saul. The man is beyond redemption.

A case in point, as we report elsewhere in this issue, are the utterances Tsvangirai made at Cyril Jennings Hall in Highfield to the effect that his party would write its own national constitution in the event it attained power in elections scheduled for next year.

His justification: ‘‘The current Lancaster (House) constitution is not ours and this one again (the Copac-led draft) is not ours. We have to come with our own document.’’

While there is nothing wrong in any government seeking to revamp a constitution, there is everything wrong when the objective of the exercise is to disenfranchise the people for the interests of outsiders.

It has to be pointed out that the MDC-T was the most vocal in demanding a people-driven constitution when other parties were open to taking the document drawn by the three main parties, the Kariba draft, to the people; and now that the people have spoken against what the MDC-T stands for, Tsvangirai is basically saying, ‘‘to hell with them’’.

How can he try to deny, with a straight face, the Copac-led process when we all know that his party is part of the tri-partisan Copac chairpersonship and is also in the thematic committees and outreach teams that gathered views across Zimbabwe?

Zimbabweans have clearly spoken on what they want in their constitution, who does Tsvangirai think he is in trying to foist the views of his external handlers on them? 

We pose this answer rhetorically for the answer is not lost to us. 

It’s evident the outreach has been a nightmare for Tsvangirai and his backers for the simple reason that it served to consolidate perceived Zanu-PF positions on the land reform programme; indigenisation and economic empowerment, and our independence and sovereignty, among other things. What miffs them the most is that their money was used to entrench the values they set the MDC to fight.

Those same values explain why MDC-T was so averse to the current Constitution that was drafted at the Lancaster House Constitutional Conference in 1979. The MDC-T’s opposition to the Lancaster House document, that has since been amended 19 times to align it to the aspirations of the indigenous majority Zimbabweans, is precisely because it safeguards what the envisaged new constitution is going to safeguard: Everything that defines us as a people distinct from others in the community of nations.

The MDC-T leader should realise that by continuing to speak for, and represent the interests of Westerners, he will never be relevant to the aspirations of the majority of Zimbabweans who will reject him in the same way they rejected the alien views and values his party hoped to entrench during the outreach.


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