27 February 2008
Posted to the web 27 February 2008

Reason Wafawarova
Sydney

The harmonised election is considered a landmark event by many people for the different meanings and opportunities it poses depending on the interests of the various players involved in the contest.

For Morgan Tsvangirai and his Western backers this election is about another opportunity not only to effect regime change in Zimbabwe, but also to embark on "Mission Vindictiveness" where pioneers and beneficiaries of the land reform programme are to be humiliated Saddam-style judging by the speech he delivered in Mutare and online reports on the MDC manifesto. Tsvangirai and his backers are clearly of the assumption that the election should deliver an opportunity for the West to showcase their supremacy by organising another sham tribunal where verdicts are made before trial, witnesses are totally disregarded, defence lawyers are assassinated and the accused are humiliated and victimised for purposes of sending a political message to sympathisers of the accused and would-be followers. This is the MDC's idea of restoring the rule of law.

To this extent Tsvangirai has been instructed to prepare the ground by announcing an election manifesto which promises something called a "Truth and Reconciliation Commission" -- a body that among other things is meant to prosecute those viewed as having spearheaded the occupation of settler-held commercial farms in 2000. In fact, the manifesto promises that the first 100 days of an MDC government would be spent appeasing the Western masters by punishing those who dared humiliate the untouchable by reclaiming stolen property from white settlers.

One doesn't have to be a genius to predict that none of the accused would stand a chance of escaping the pre-determined verdict if ever a Tsvangirai were to assume the leadership of the country.

It is also clear that the wish to reverse the land reform programme and to vindictively punish some people for having taken part in it is totally unacceptable to the generality of Zimbabweans. Needless to say, it is also unachievable given that no sane Zimbabwean would stand aside and look when one of their own is made to stand trial, let alone get sentenced for repossessing their land that had been stolen. That will simply never happen in Zimbabwe and the reason for that is very simple. It will not be allowed to happen.

For Simba Makoni, this election is about opportunism and nothing else. Here is a man who has been lying in the shadow of the revolution for almost three decades and at a time the revolution is calling for unity of purpose he has seen the challenges from the enemy side as an opportunity for his own ascendancy. Opportunism has always been a thornbush in every revolution and Makoni is not by any means the pioneer chancer of this planet. He comes on the shoulders of the likes of Edgar Tekere, Enoch Dumbutshena and many others across the globe.

Makoni has been part of the revolution and he has seen the effects of the economic strangulation as executed by the strategic attempted isolation of Zimbabwe through the sanctions regime mobilised by Britain on behalf of a few whites dispossessed of the stolen farms they had occupied for about 100 years.

The West has insisted that the sanctions have a benign effect on the economy and whatever is not working well is a result of bad policies by the Government. Despite having been part of the policy-making process in Zimbabwe and having admitted in the past that sanctions had a ruinous effect on the economy, Makoni sees prudence in taking an opportunistic somersault and trying to use the pain created by this strangulation to his selfish advantage.

For Makoni the best ally in this election is the suffering of Zimbabweans -- a suffering that Tsvangirai partly created by his call for sanctions. Naturally this hijacking of the sanctions project by Makoni has not amused Tsvangirai. Makoni knows that Tsvangirai is tainted by his call for the sanctions and he reckons that he can charm voters by promising to be Mr. Fix It.

Indeed Makoni is playing classical opportunist by exploiting the suffering of the people in his efforts to snatch votes from both Zanu-PF and the MDC. He has chosen to betray the revolution by joining the enemy on one hand and he has also resolved to exploit Tsvangirai's sanctions regime to his advantage on the other.

The problem with Makoni is that he is a victim of delusions of grandeur. The man believes the mirror too much. He is also easily flattered even by intoxicated voices. Ibbo Mandaza takes one too many of his whisky shots and tells Makoni what his drunken mind sees as public opinion. He says "everyone" knows Simba is the "only one" who can lead this country. Mandaza tells Makoni that everyone is charmed by Simba's looks and charisma and Makoni swallows that declaration hook, line and sinker.

From July 2007 to date Makoni has been deceiving himself before the mirror each morning as he has been rehearsing to put up the face of a president. Just like with every model whose friends and relatives assure them that they are the best there ever was the mirror can be atrociously deceiving. It takes honest people to remind a victim of the mirror of their real look against that of other contestants. Mandaza and Kudzai Mbudzi do not have the qualities of honesty and anyone surrounded by such men is set to suffer a lot of delusions, grandeur included.

For others election 2008 is about self-interests. These are the politicians who see in elections an opportunity to amass wealth by way of abuse of political office. It would appear like Zimbabwe has an abundance of these criminals and fraudsters if the level of corruption in the public and private sectors is to be used as a reliable measure. In this group there is also those career politicians who are unemployable in any other profession. This is often a result of a lack of any professional qualification or business acumen and also a result of a lack of professional character and conduct. In this group there are also those who are purely driven by ambition to make a name for themselves and these will rest once they believe they have had enough publicity, and normally they serve no more than one term in office.

For the masses of Zimbabwe this election is about defending the revolution and the country's sovereignty. It is about safeguarding the gains and progress achieved after independence. The election is about finding a way forward with the revolution. It is about choosing honest leadership to steer Zimbabwe to ultimate victory.

It is about fighting corruption, about fighting treachery, about making the agrarian reform a success -- it is about reviving the production sector and it is about creating jobs for the working class. Yet for some voters it is about anything that can take away sanctions. It is about anything that can bring back the favour of Westerners. It is about anything that can reduce the hardships in the economy. To some even a settler government is acceptable for as long as there will be aid and some form of jobs for a sizeable few. For these people this election is about any form of change. What happens after the change will have to be faced as it comes. These are the surrendered souls who have neither knowledge nor pride in what is supposed to be their heritage.

To President Mugabe this election is about directing the revolution. The election comes at a time revolutionaries like Hugo Chavez are scoring major victories against the imperial enemy. It comes when revolutionaries like Mahmoud Ahmadinejad are standing their ground against the marauding forces of the US-led Western alliance. The election comes at a time when the longest serving revolutionary and the world's greatest soldier of ideas - Commandant Fidel Castro of Cuba -- is passing on the revolutionary baton to the next generation - that on his own terms and on the terms of the Cuban revolution and not by way of succumbing to the 50-year-old US barbaric pressure. In an interview in 1971, during his visit to Chile, Fidel Castro said the following regarding the Chilean revolution: "We believe that, in a revolutionary process, each separate thing cannot be analysed separately. Every problem has to be analysed from the standpoint of the whole process . . ."

Zimbabwe's inflation rate cannot be analysed separately. The brain drain cannot be analysed separately, the commodity shortages cannot be analysed separately, the economic hardships cannot be analysed separately and the unemployment cannot be analysed separately. These are the sequels of the terrains through which a revolution has to pass. They make up the trail and trace of any successful revolution. These challenges make up the scars and history of the success ahead. To this end they should therefore be analysed from the standpoint of the entire revolution.

It is not the sole responsibility of President Mugabe or the Zanu-PF leadership to take care of the revolution. The agrarian revolution is a baby of the masses and as a matter of fundamental strategy; the masses have to take care of this revolution. This election presents any opportunity for the defence of the revolution and this baby called the agrarian revolution cries loud and endless for protection from its mother. Its mother is not President Mugabe. It is not even any of the politicians. The mother of the baby is the peasantry of Zimbabwe -- it is the masses settled on the land of Zimbabwe.

It is these masses who will have to nurse the baby, to take care of it, to keep it from getting sick, from being contaminated and from being killed. It is only the masses who command the strength to raise and defend the child. The baby is under threat from within and from without and only the masses can defend this child. To this end election 2008 is a revolutionary call to national duty.

There are those who stand against imperialism for the sole purpose of identifying with the revolution while they actually stand for individualistic and selfish interests. Those who by day shout out their voices against imperialism and yet by night they corruptly resell government-supplied farming inputs for a quick profit must not be forgiven by the masses. These are the enemies of the people. Those who take advantage of the suffering of the masses to profiteer in business are the enemies of the people. Those who exacerbate the suffering of the people by calling for sanctions against Zimbabwe are the enemies of the people and the masses have the power to deal with these people ruthlessly. The masses have election 2008 to deal these traitors the biggest blow of their lives.

Those who promise imperialists that they would reverse people-driven policies for the benefit of foreign capital are the enemies of the people and they deserve no mercy in the March 2008 election. The strength of the masses lies in unity and this unity becomes invincible when it is unity in pursuit of a programme, of an objective and of clearly defined goals. For Zimbabwe the programme is the agrarian revolution, the objective is production to self-sufficiency levels and for export. The defined goals include earning through agriculture, enough foreign currency to invest in manufacturing, extraction and service industries.

To achieve this the masses must unite with the workers and with other forces from the social set-up of the country. There must be goodwill from the youth, the intellectuals, the petty bourgeoisie and the industrialists. There is no question about it -- the revolutionary strategy must make tactics subordinate to the attainment of the fundamental objective, which in essence is the total liberation of the people of Zimbabwe from all forms of imperialist domination.

It is most important that the masses understand these ideas thoroughly. These ideas form the broad front in the struggle against the principal enemy. Zimbabwe can always draw strength from the masses in Cuba. For 50 years they have remained focused on defeating the enemy and the US have been shamed times without end although they will always stick it out the way of the unthinking bully.

When the US descended on Vietnam in the unjustified invasion of the seventies, the Vietnamese people stood their ground and defeated the enemy. To this day Vietnam stands as the best example of our times -- their strategy, their tactics, their capacity for attaining unity, their wisdom in making tactics subordinate to strategy and in mobilising all the elements needed for their main struggle. This is the strategy and the resolve that defeated the marauding gangsters who called themselves the anti-communist Western alliance, as led by the US.

It is important that the enemy realises that the masses of Zimbabwe are on the alert and ready to go into action. It is also important that the masses define the fate of Zimbabwe on their own terms and that they use their extra-ordinary strength to defend the revolution as the need arises. The West would want to sell the idea that election 2008 is about reformist politics - by which they mean pro-capitalist reforms meant to reverse not only the land reform programme but also the other gains of independence. They will endeavour to sell reformist politicians like Makoni just like they tried in vain to sell Tsvangirai as a democrat.

Every revolutionary worth the name knows that Zimbabwe is in the phase of takeover politics and this election is about takeover politics and it is a perpetuation of the fighting spirit that began with an imposed rule in 1890. The election shows the unity of spirit between those who departed during the First and Second Chimurengas and those who are still living. In this election Zimbabweans have a duty, not only to themselves but also to the unborn generations of Zimbabwe, and that duty is to defend Zimbabwe from the threat of imperial domination and neo-colonialism. We are our own liberators and March 29 presents a perfect opportunity to take a big stride towards total national liberation.

This election is not about individuals offering solutions for Zimbabwe. It is about the people finding a solution to the problems bedevilling the country. The farm mechanisation programme has been a good start but it can only succeed if the beneficiaries are committed to the objective and goal of the revolution. The solution is in a collective approach and not some team of ambitious politicians.

It is homeland or death. This is the moment of the masses and together we will overcome.