… international mediator needed to facilitate negotiations
THE country last week held parliamentary and council by-elections. The Nelson Chamisa-led Citizens Coalition for Change won 19 of the 28 parliamentary constituencies which were at stake. Zanu PF won nine, while the MDC headed by Douglas Mwonzora failed to secure even a single seat.
Soon after the polls, CCC and MDC called for dialogue to ensure a free and fair general election next year. Zanu PF said it was open to talks.
The call for dialogue has been growing by the day, but is yet to come to fruition. The church is also pushing for an all-inclusive dialogue.
Last Thursday, one of the country’s outspoken clerics, Zimbabwe Divine Destiny Church leader, Bishop Ancelimo Magaya, told the new independent national television station, 3Ktv, that the country needed talks like yesterday to resolve its decades long political and economic crises.
Below are the excerpts of the 3Ktv Vantage programme interview Magaya had with the Editor-In-Chief Guthrie Munyuki.
Q: Every time the country holds elections people become animated and tension kicks in and every time when elections results are announced there are disputes, has this become the new normal in our democratic processes? We have just concluded the by-elections and a lot of people have expressed concerns over voter apathy, what’s your reading into this?
A: This is very unfortunate that we experience things like this voter apathy and what you have alluded to, tension rising resulting from elections. We have a history of disputed elections.
Over the past years, people have really felt that elections or no election, voting or no voting, is going to be the same because what people would have expected would not go the way they have expected. So it is unfortunate that we are in a polarised political context.
We would want people to view things either or and I think that is very unfortunate. What I need to quickly say is this is not the ideal situation where we can solve our own problems.
We can get into elections that all participants are happy to participate in and happy in whatever result that will come out.
Q: So in other words you are pointing out that some legacy results from previous elections could have contributed to the apathy we observed over the weekend?
A: Precisely the point, there has been always debates around the voters roll, independence of Zec (Zimbabwe Electoral Commission). There are things which have happened before or years back, eg, 2008 when we had elections and results didn’t come out on time for people to trust that these are credible processes and yes, we have not resolved these processes on that very faulty ground and that’s the reason why people do not have a shared and understanding regarding their own electoral processes.
Q: What we witnessed last week could be avoided in future if all things will be dealt with?
A: What we witnessed last week can be avoided in the future. To be very clear about what happened last week, we got into an election where prior to the election, don’t forget that elections is not an event, it is a process.
We had campaigning period where the contestants were going out there and we have unfortunately witnessed violence that has not been fairly responded to, we have no justice around that violence, some people were murdered in Kwekwe, we noted that people were arrested and quickly released.
We also noted that violence is implicating the security sector, but also very sadly… the shambolic nature of the voters rolls. I happen to be part of the people who have been monitoring these elections and it was sad to note that a massive number of people were turned away from voting where as they did vote last time at the same polling stations because their names were not found on the printed voters roll even though they would have found their names on the electronic versions through the mobile app, that was absurd.
Q: Is it the role of Zec alone to sensitise the electorate about some of these things or political parties themselves have to educate their own people?
A: It is not the role of Zec alone, but look Zec has a mandate to make sure that people vote properly, to make sure as they compile names, as they work on that voters roll, as they compile names, that the voters roll is clean.
You don’t vote in 2018 and you check your name, it has nothing to do with the political party. It is up to the electoral board that has been entrusted to make sure that people vote and vote for what they want.
Politicians will have to teach their people to create that consciousness, even the civil society and church have the responsibility, but here I put the blame squarely on Zec because they are the ones who have been mandated to make sure that the voters roll is clean. I don’t do the voters roll in my church
Q: Zec were here on this programme two weeks ago and said it is not their mandate to institute electoral reforms which could address some of the issues you are alluding to, who do you blame on the lack of political reforms?
A: It might not be their mandate, but I also wonder if they will be prohibited if they demand an environment that will make it easy to work. You don’t want to preside over a system which is shambolic, which doesn’t flow.
Well, people will blame you. If you are employed, there you are constituted, make it very clear to the government and parliament that you want to work in a place where you work quite freely.
What is also very important is that our politicians across all sections have to understand their role to make sure that they make laws and they should not make just laws when we are drawing closer to elections whether Zanu PF, MDC, CCC, these parliamentarians should work hard even if you are within the ruling party.
You need to objectively look at issues so that what is not right for everybody is simply not right for everybody. These are universal issues we are talking about here.
Q: Why is the church failing to speak with one voice as far as reforms are concerned?
A: The problem that we have is that Zimbabwe is torrid, through a torrid socio-economic and political landscape. Central to this challenge is polarisation.
We have seen this country torn in-between and divided. You are either for this or not.
You have witnessed a situation where you speak a given language, eg, you talk about democracy, human rights and justice, and people will associate you with the opposition.
If you speak the language of sovereignty, patriotism, people will align you to the ruling Zanu PF. I want people to understand all these concepts.
It is very sad for the church, instead of rising beyond this parochial, very meiotic partisan line, the church has really allowed itself to be limited.
We need to speak the word of God, when the prophecy that lived in the old world spoke, it didn’t mirror which king was and Nathan noted that David had committed adultery with Uriah’s wife and subsequently killed Uriah.
Nathan went to King David and told him that, sir you are the man that is responsible for this chaos.
The church has to speak truth to power. It doesn’t matter who has done it, if it’s the opposition or ruling party they have to do so.
The problem that we have is that we have allowed politicians to define our language and philosophy, which is very sad.
Q: Are we going to see a clean break from these issues where the church does not speak in one voice going forward?
A: We are a work in progress. I want to assure you that the church, I for one where I am coming from as Zimbabwe Divine Destiny, a church-based organisation that agitates for justice and peace, we have been reaching out to our mother bodies and I know for sure that there is no leader I haven’t reached to in particular those who are in the evangelical fellowship of Zimbabwe, The Zimbabwe Catholic Bishops Conference Yuda Cesare, Zimbabwe Council of Churches.
The whole idea is let us reduce the gap and let’s speak with one voice. What determines the voice is the truth as it is enshrined in the word of God.
The word of God say justice and righteousness are the frown of your foundation. We would want to see righteousness and justice being fundamentally underpinning our governance systems.
The moment that we identify the mind and the heart of God with regards to governance issues, trust me we will speak in one voice.
Jeremiah Chapter 23, God is saddened by the prophets of Jerusalem having strengthened the hands of the evil systems because they have not rebuked them.
If you had rebuked them they would have repented. We would want a church that speaks truth to power and when that happens our nation will be healed.
Q: The church has previously said it would want to advocate for a moratorium on elections, what is your view on that?
A: I do understand the advancement of their view. It’s simply because of the disputable elections, of the toxic nature of our electoral process.
Some of our leaders feel that if you have the moratorium, we abstain from elections for a period of seven years and they will call it sabbatical leave from elections, things will be better.
I argue it differently. I think it has to be political will. If politicians want today to take a will, we will have electoral reforms yesterday.
You know what happened in 2017 when we shifted from President Mugabe to President Mnangagwa, that whole transition did not take us beyond two weeks.
Within two weeks things had changed, we witnessed police ceasing corruption on road blocks for a while.
I wouldn’t want to evaluate, but if President Mnangagwa wills, if the cabinet wills, parliamentarians from all political parties are willing, electoral reforms will happen today, so we don’t have to wait for seven years.
Q: But should it only take one side to show the will or it is the duty of every Zimbabwean to be able to be involved in that process?
A: It’s the duty of every Zimbabwean. We were chatting the other day about politicians partying on our heads and they are sitting upon us. If these people are set upon us, if they rise, these guys will stop partying on our heads.
If you think you want to leave it to politicians then you won’t get it forever. Zimbabweans, particularly the church, should demand electoral reforms.
We can leverage on our numbers, we have people that go to church and 80 percent Christians who meet on a Sunday or on a Saturday and these people do hear the voice of a pastor, prophet or an apostle.
I would like the church to understand that we need to realise and appreciate the power that we have. Let us empower our people to demand what is due to them.
Q: What sort of dialogue would you want to see happening?
A: Let me underscore the importance of dialogue. Dialogue is the ultimate endgame no matter how protagonists fight and grandstand, you have dialogue eventually… In 1979 Smith had just stated never in a thousand years, then he was dragged to the Lancaster House.
Dialogue resulted from a protracted struggle and in 2008, President Mugabe and Former prime minister Morgan Tsvangirai ended up dialoguing because it is important, they couldn’t fail to dialogue.
Mugabe and Joshua Nkomo dialogued. Normally dialogue happens when parties no longer have options.
In the case of Smith, the war was no longer sustainable, the comrades has just bombed the petrol tanks and he was seen in the morning with his gumboots wondering because he could no longer sustain it.
But also our liberators fighters, the war was becoming tiresome. They were tired of sponsoring this long protracted process.
Our cattle were also running out because we couldn’t feed the comrades, nobody had options anymore so they had to talk and leverage on whatever they had.
Mugabe in 2008 didn’t have the legitimacy he had military backing and Tsvangirai didn’t have, but he had the people so we need to come together and have it all, we need to dialogue.
Dialogue is not supposed to be an electoral pact; it shouldn’t be one of the special groups of people who end up sharing power. We are talking about an all-inclusive dialogue where the masses determine the agenda.
Q: Who should mediate in this dialogue?
A: Anybody who is credible, a person that both parties will agree to. I will suggest somebody international and expert in diplomacy and mediation.
But I also think this should be done together with the church. We have the church that can actually support this external person, we have the likes of Mohlante, Frank Chikani, and he is a man of God in South Africa.
This needs to be backed by our local systems. Only church leaders and people who are viewed to be nonpartisan on these matters of parochial limited politics (should mediate).
The Bible says come here and let’s reason together… We need to reason together.
Q: There are many Zimbabweans out there who are clamouring for a return to something that induces stability, like the 2009 GNU… What’s your view on a return to GNU?
A: I will not out rightly speak against it, but see the GNU that we had even in 1988, we don’t want anyone to end up consuming each other.
We want a GNU or any government that proceeds from an electoral process that is sound and anchored on a solid ground. We want democracy rule for the people by the people.
When a GNU results from such a process then that is fine.
We don’t want a GNU for purposes of sharing power and eating whilst the populace is suffering, not at all.
We need an electoral process which results in a credible government.
What I know is citizens are ready, the church is ready, but some of the politicians may not be ready because I know there are people who flourish on different things.
There are people who flourish on violence, faulty foundations. We need to have a Zec that is cleaner than what it is now which has credibility to run elections that everybody will be happy to see.
People might not be ready, but a lot of us are ready and let’s all define the agenda of the dialogue.