The three most senior MDC-Alliance leaders, including the
president Nelson Chamisa and his co-deputies Tendai Biti and Welshman Ncube are
all lawyers by profession.
Mwonzora, who is gunning for the MDC-T presidency at
tomorrow’s extraordinary congress, also refuted claims his outfit was a Zanu PF
project to destroy the opposition in the country.
“The recalls had to happen. We did not expel anybody from
the party. People who were recalled expelled themselves. In terms of the
constitution of the MDC-T, if you join or form another political party, you
cease to be a member of the MDC-T automatically. So by their actions these men
and women ceased to be MPs and councilors of the MDC-T,” Mwonzora said in an
interview.
“What we did was to inform parliament about that, to inform
the minister (Local Government), to inform the councils. These men and women
knew about the section of the constitution and certainly the leaders of the
MDC-Alliance, who are lawyers, knew about the constitution that it provided for
that, yet they sacrificed their members; they treated their members like cannon
fodder and we regret that there were recalls but these recalls were necessary,”
he said.
“We do not exist to recall people and as secretary general,
I had to sign the recall letters and it is like signing a death warrant for
somebody and it’s not an enjoyable exercise. So we want to plead with our
friends in the MDC-Alliance to be responsible, the leaders to be responsible.
We have lawyers in the MDC-Alliance; they have Biti, they have Ncube and the
president too; those people badly let their members down by not advising them
on issues of law,” Mwonzora said.
“Our agenda in parliament is to bring key political, social
and economic reforms in Zimbabwe. So after our congress you will see that we
will concentrate on the reform agenda. One of the reforms of course is the
electoral reforms that we are going to concentrate on. Under these electoral
reforms is to have what we call the diaspora vote. We think that the diaspora
has been playing a key role in sustaining the families in Zimbabwe so they have
been contributing to the country’s gross domestic product,” he said.
“So they need the right to vote. What we are going to do as
MDC is to present the paper in parliament, to the Ministry of Justice, as well
as to the Zimbabwe Electoral Commission on how to make the diaspora vote
credible and safe to answer to the questions that Zanu PF has been giving with
regards to the diaspora vote.”
Mwonzora said their agenda was to make sure that they keep
the government busy and to fulfill what it promised to the electorate but not
to praise the government.
“We also make sure that the people of Zimbabwe are not
shortchanged by the government; that is our agenda as MPs, we are not there as
praise singers of the ruling party, but of course, when they do something which
is correct, we must acknowledge, we must be able to say that you have done
something correct. But we are not an extension of the ruling party,” he said.
He said after congress people would start to see MDC-T’s
new way of doing things, adding that he was sure to romp to victory ahead of
the acting party leader Khupe, Elias Mudzuri and Morgan Komichi.
“On the by-elections, we said we were ready for the
by-elections, we are not as weak as people think, but let me tell you that the
party which has gone to court to stop the by-election is the MDC-Alliance. In
June this year, Chalton Hwende, Happymore Chidziva and Prosper Mutseyami went
to court and cited MDC-T, President of Zimbabwe, ZEC and Justice minister and
their prayer was that there must be no by-elections.”
He said it is them who stopped the by-election and when the
Ministry of Health announced a ban of by-elections, they started complaining
forgetting that they are the ones who went to court to stop the by-elections.
The MDC-T has recalled over 30 legislators and over 100
MDC-Alliance councillors across the country. The development critics say has
weakened service delivery in councils and left constituencies without
representatives in parliament, thereby increasing the chances of the affected
areas lagging behind in development. Zimbabwe
Independent
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