IT is disturbing to note the current developments in MDC Alliance whereby the internally organised violence is perpetually shifting away from the founding values of the party. The unrest brought by the youths in the form of claiming unconstitutional power and unfounded authority should not be tolerated.
Senator James Makore
The youths have no mandate to stop a member of the executive from entering any MDC offices for any reason. That is not within their jurisdiction. They are entitled to make recommendations to the national executive, which is an administrative body of the party and ultimately to the national council.
We are aware that some are ignorant of their role and function as organs of the party. The youths and women structures were for mobilisation and organising people. These structures are not independent and uncontrolled as they might appear to be. They report all their activities to the national executive for approval before implementation .
What they have done is gross indiscipline.
It was not within their jurisdiction to brew an idea and implement. Their resolution, if any, had to be subjected to a procedural process to avoid the rule of the jungle, as is the case now.
In the meantime, the youths are not doing the party any good other than tarnishing the image of the institution. The MDC should be known for its values: Freedom, democracy, equality, fairness, justice, unity, solidarity, accountability, transparency and non-discrimination.
No one, other than labour, brought a cent to the formation of the MDC; for that reason it is a right for any one to contest for any position in the party without being intimidated by anyone.
As shown above, the MDC is a social democratic party different from a nationalist, communist party such as Zanu PF and the Chinese Communist Party and their sister parties in Russia and Cuba.
No one owns this party and no one is qualified to dictate a position to anyone other than the congress of the people, for the people by the people.
Senator Douglas Togarasei Mwonzora should enjoy similar rights as a full member of this party. Since its inception and from his trade union days he has been able to contest for any position of his choice when the time of contestation came and no one should begrudge him for that.
If he commits a crime, disciplinary procedures should be applied like is common to everyone. It is very annoying to entrench hateful behaviour for greed of power as we are now witnessing in the party.
After all, not even one of these people could be associated to the late Morgan Tsvangirai, a founding member of the MDC, they all joined the party. It’s high time people should show maturity, cultivate confidence from the people that they could run a government in future.
This kind of violence is self defeating. Matters should be solved amicably, without emotions and with full regards to respecting each other.
Stop violence and be respectful. A continuation of violence against fellow senior party members will invite embargoes on the party by various organisations, not only in the Sadc region, but Africa as a whole and beyond.
