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Morgan Tsvangirai

MDC-T leader Mr Morgan Tsvangirai’s decision in Bulawayo on Saturday to bar his officials from giving interviews to The Herald and ZBC is not only undemocratic but is also shocking.
Here is a man who claims to be a proponent of democracy who gags party officials from talking to the nation through media of their choice.

Besides promoting gross intolerance, the statements stifle freedom of expression and association, infringe on media freedoms and are against the “media reforms” that he has been crying about for long.

Lest Mr Tsvangirai does not know, the public media are not there to sing his praises, but to handle serious national matters and promote the national interest ahead of partisan considerations.

If Mr Tsvangirai wants media that play a lapdog role, his party has a mouthpiece that will dance to his tune and forever sing his praises.

For such irresponsible statements to go unchallenged by all the media in Zimbabwe will be a travesty of justice because sooner or later, some thugs in the opposition party loyal to him will be butchering media practitioners and MDC-T officials who give interviews to the public media.

Surely such statements coming from a former Prime Minister of Zimbabwe, who still harbours ambitions of becoming President of this country, is disturbing to say the least.

Mr Tsvangirai likes posturing as a national leader and it is time he started acting like one.

His statements come barley a month after he reportedly stood and watched as his thugs beat up senior party officials who have been critical of his leadership.

Not only that, one of his loyalists, party spokesperson Mr Douglas Mwonzora is representing the alleged thugs in court, essentially telling the nation that no attack took place on deputy treasurer Mr Elton Mangoma outside MDC-T’s headquarters in Harare.

Several other officials have abandoned Mr Tsvangirai in the past because of the violent streak that he and his cronies have pointedly failed to condemn and arrest.

What is to stop Mr Tsvangirai from tacitly authorising physical attacks on any other Zimbabwean? His thugs have in the past beaten up journalists and Mr Tsvangirai has on, at least one other occasion, publicly expressed hostility to the media.

We have seen how they attacked journalist Herbert Moyo at Harvest House and barred him from covering a demonstration there, while reporters from our Bulawayo Bureau were also assaulted and had their notebooks confiscated.

Mr Tsvangirai should walk the talk on issues of media freedom, democracy, and the right for people to express themselves and earn a decent living without going about their duties in fear of his drunk thugs and acolytes who make it their life mission to demonise anyone who says “Tsvangirai must go”.

It is time Mr Tsvangirai gets serious about public life and national politics.

If he cannot be serious about that, then perhaps the many MDC-T officials who want him out are right after all.