IT was, as has become the norm, inevitable that once MDC leader Nelson Chamisa took to the microphone, he would huff and puff, blowing hot air — only this time his speech was replete with threats against Government; ominous threats at that.

This is a route that we have gone through before, a route where, at the core of the MDC’s politics, are the twin pillars of anarchy and violence.

The years preceding January 2019 gave us a glimpse of the depths that supposed ‘anger’ of the successive stuttering MDC leaders can reach so that they can assume residency at Number 1 Chancellor Avenue.

Then no one was spared.

Police stations, property, buses, rivals in the party and anything they could lay their hands on was demolished by the MDC goons.

Their leader then, the late Morgan Richard Tsvangirai, never made a secret that he was behind those heinous attacks on people and property.

But it was in January 2019 that the MDC was at its usual best; unleashing a torrent of violence that has undoubtedly left the country’s social fabric (of unity and cohesion) severely fragmented.

The country was subjected to some of the most vicious violence ever witnessed in post-colonial Zimbabwe.

Even the effervescent Rhodesians would have admired the violence meted on hapless Zimbabweans by the marauding MDC youths.

There was expectation that regardless of how he stole power in the MDC, Chamisa would be a marked departure from the ‘angry’ politics of confrontation that had marred his party, but with each passing day, all that is dissipating in the four winds.

Chamisa is full of childish antics.

That is a matter for him to deal with if he is still dreaming about fulfilling his political ambitions.

But our thrust this week is on his reckless utterances at Dzivarasekwa during the ZCTU Worker’s Day commemorations.

From the onset, every sensible Zimbabwean should take exception to those threats against Government and the peace loving citizens of this great country.

“The working class agenda is still the centre of the agenda,” Chamisa said.

“ZCTU is organising people, MDC is mobilising people, civil society is co-ordinating people. We don’t need any money from the British. Our co-ordinator is poverty, our mobiliser is unemployment.

“The crisis in the present administration of Mnangagwa is that their core business is not to plan, but to plot.

“There won’t be a way forward in this country before we dialogue. We must agree that elections were stolen. Yes, the court finished the legal dispute, but there is a political dispute. Courts do not adjudicate political disputes, we need to dialogue about the future of this country.”

Two critical issues emerge from Chamisa’s confrontational outburst.

First, is the issue of workers, which he prefers to call the ‘the working class agenda’. By merely singling them out for mention, he is departing from other members of the social hierarchy.

This is the other group that President Emmerson Dambudzo Mnangagwa and his administration have been working hard to cushion from a preying arrogant business sector which has been ripping the majority of their hard-earned cash.

Indeed, and if anything, the business sector has been unfairly profiteering from an already hard-pressed majority with no sense of shame or remorse whatsoever.

Thankfully, Government is working hard on redressing that shameful, outrageous malady from the business sector.

The time is coming when surely there will be swift separation of those who are for the people and those who are against them.

Those who have eyes and ears stand guided by this warning.

Chamisa also stands warned against tossing around the emotions of workers like a coin because that coin might not find a side to fall on.

It can go either way.

The second issue, which, to all intents and purposes, is becoming a nauseating narrative in our politics, is that of his nebulous obsession with conditional dialogue.

In the first instance is the compelling fact that he lost the July 31 2018 elections fair and square as confirmed by the will of the people of Zimbabwe and the country’s courts of law.

That alone nullifies his inane harpings which, in all fairness, firmly and permanently reside in his warped wits that he ‘won’ those polls.

It is from that pervasive fact that Chamisa is not, and can never be, in a position to set conditions, let alone make determinations to the effect that he can cajole ED or ZANU PF to the ‘negotiating’ table.

That will never happen for as long as the young man does not humble himself and come to terms with fact that ED and ZANU PF are in power and they are here to stay. 

Finally, threats of demonstrations will never scare ZANU PF.

If anything, they do little to the youngster’s faltering cause since the ruling party cannot be waylaid to dialogue by a day dreamer.

Those who are planning those demonstrations will have to contend with the full wrath of the law.

Let those with ears listen.