Despite their bravado and hysterical hoofing on the need to have electoral reforms as precondition for them to participate in future elections, it has emerged that fear of another crushing defeat and lack of funds to foot the cost of the campaigns are the major reasons why the MDC-T is boycotting the forthcoming polls. It is important to keep this in mind when unpacking the MDC-T propaganda against the forthcoming by-elections in Zimbabwe.

WHEN Zimbabwe holds a ‘mini’ general election on June 10 2015, there will be no grand prize on offer.
It will just be a mere formality and fulfillment of a constitutional obligation.
The country will be trying to solve the mess created by the MDC-T split and the expulsion of ZANU PF duo of Themba Mliswa and his maverick uncle Didymus Mutasa.
For ZANU PF it will be about consolidating its two thirds majority in Parliament and asserting its undisputed position as the leading political party in the country.
Yet the focus refuses to elude the MDC-T and their never ending shenanigans.
There is a feeling that by ‘boycotting’ this poll, the MDC-T has managed to solicit for the attention it wanted, but one it never deserved.
This abstinence from the June 10 elections was and is never about electoral reforms as the MDC-T wants everyone to believe.
On the contrary, there is genuine fear within MDC-T that it is no longer the force that it claimed to be because ZANU PF managed to go back to the people and won their hearts again in clinical fashion.
At its congress in October 2014, the MDC-T did a post-mortem of its performance in the historic July 31 2013 harmonised elections where a disastrous and dreadful outing saw it being thumped by a resurgent and super-charged ZANU PF.
The immediate response to the July 31 2013 massacre was that the MDC-T, despite claiming to be a party on the rebound, was not yet ready for another poll.
Those inside the embattled party called it ‘blunt strategy trauma’, in reference to their stunt manifesto which failed to find any takers in the run-up to the said polls.
Then the MDC-T was battling to contain contagious rebellion that was being led by the then secretary-general, Tendai Biti and former treasurer-general, Elton Mangoma.
Biti and Mangoma announced on April 26 2014 at Mandel Training Centre that they had relieved MDC-T leader Morgan Tsvangirai of his duties, citing a cocktail of allegations among them, that Tsvangirai was now a ‘tired’ brand.
A weakened MDC-T would never have squared off and conquered a ZANU PF basking on the glory of its July 31 2013 exploits, hence the October 2014 Congress.
Within the MDC-T there has always been a voracious fixation with the spotlight, a key strategy to attract and squander donor funding.
With Biti and Mangoma gone, coupled with the MDC-T’s humiliating electoral defeat to ZANU PF, the donors retreated.
On the other hand, two key events were unfolding in Zimbabwe.
First were re-engagement efforts by Western countries.
This signalled their complete disengagement from their unison with the MDC-T.
Second, was the reshaping of ZANU PF through its cleansing exercise.
The MDC-T thought they had grabbed an opportunity they so desired through perpetuating their old and tired song that ZANU PF is an undemocratic outfit.
Still there were no takers.
And the poll boycott threat was fast running out of steam.
The MDC-T needed something new, something to propagate their calls for poll boycott and which polls they knew were coming anyway.
Fast forward to events of March 2015.
On March 7 this year, the MDC-T held a rally in Highfield where the Itai Dzamara factor would be used to as an entry point to cause consternation in the country.
Or so the MDC-T thought!
On March 9, Dzamara, who was among those who addressed the Highfield rally, was abducted by ‘unknown’ men.
The MDC-T swiftly pointed fingers at ZANU PF and the state security agencies for the Dzamara abduction.
The calls for poll boycott grew louder.
On March 17, a total of 21 MDC-T Members of Parliament were booted out of the House of Assembly, joining Mliswa and Mutasa who had suffered similar fate a few days earlier.
Tsvangirai immediately flew to Washington carrying the message that all was not well in Harare, also with the hope of dampening the March 27 and June 10 2015 by-elections.
America snubbed Tsvangirai.
It will continue to do so what with their new found allies in the form of former Vice-President Joice Mujuru grouping now coming out in the open and confirming what we at The Patriot have always said about them.
The March 27 by-elections went ahead as scheduled.
The June 10 by-elections will come and go and further relegate the MDC-T to the dirty shores of history.
Memories of Tsvangirai, wide-eyed, attempting to explain yet another inept MDC-T electoral performance and ZANU PF ‘brutality’, but more often lurching unwittingly from one press conference faux pas to another, already feel like fragments of an ancient past.
This is a Zimbabwe moving beyond the MDC-T’s petty politics of drawing unnecessary focus and attention on the country.
More significantly, no one will be listening to this nonsense.
Let those with ears listen.