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Welshman Ncube

Lovemore Mataire Senior Reporter
THE much hyped union of the MDC led by Professor Welshman Ncube and the Mrs Sekai Holland led Renewal Party has suffered a still-birth because of a leadership crisis.

Sources close to developments in both parties said unity seemed to have been stalled by leadership wrangles.

“The truth of the matter is that there is a serious crisis in terms of who is to lead the party. On one side there is (Mr Tendai) Biti and (Mr Elton) Mangoma while on the other side people are not agreed on Professor Ncube whom they see as a liability given his tribal tendencies,” said a source who requested anonymity.

Besides the leadership wrangles, the two parties were also not agreed on the ideological foundation of the party as others argued the party should not pursue the same liberal policies that led to the dismal failure of the MDC-T in the 2013 harmonised elections.

“The crisis that confronts so-called opposition in Zimbabwe is that they are fake alternatives which are not rooted in any ideological framework.

“As such the parties neither acknowledge nor celebrate the liberation ethos and as such are viewed as Western appendages fixated on the removal of an individual from power,” said the source.

Contacted for comment, spokesperson for the MDC Renewal Team Mr Jacob Mafume attributed the delay in the merger to the slow pace of the roadmap which the two parties are expected to roll out and implement before a joint congress set for July this year.

“We have a roadmap in place that we are supposed to implement after the signing ceremony of the two parties. First, the two parties need to audit their structures and submit results of the audits to a council of elders who will then verify the audits at both district and provincial levels.

“The two parties will then hold their respective congresses before a joint congress to be held in July or August,” said Mr Mafume.

Spokesperson for the MDC Mr Nhlanhla Dube said there was nothing amiss in the delay in the amalgamation of the two parties as there were still a lot of things to be sorted out before they could become a single entity.