Tame the political beasts

The message sent out jointly is clear and loud — perpetrators of political violence risk plunging their primitive fingers in red-hot coals of the law, if the denunciation of political-related violence by the High Court judges is anything to go by, and there is no reason to think otherwise.

One assumes therefore that the courts have lined up the harshest possible sanctions against thugs who take the law into their own hands, and what remains is for the police to present a strong case against culprits for the courts to do what they know best in maintaining law and order in the State.

The writing is on the wall as it were, and political beasts must take heed or else they will have only themselves to blame for roasting their own fingers.

That is one side of the story; the other, and an equally important one, is that the burden of proof against violence rests with political parties themselves because it is they which inculcate a culture of violence among the thuggish youths they let loose on members of rival parties.

Thus, the thinly veiled message from those who administer the law of the land is that leaders of political organisations must themselves eschew jungle law in recruiting new members in preference to persuasive communication as a more civilised way into the hearts and minds of potential political converts.

It goes without saying that conversion through conviction pays handsome dividends as opposed to brute force which keeps new recruits in fetters of fear.

It surprises no-one when an opportunity occurs and there is a jail break by the political prisoners in question.

While there appears to be no ambiguity in the pronouncements against violence by the guardians of the law, in both the judiciary and the police, no unanimity against violence appears to exist among Zimbabwe’s political parties as only Zanu-PF is on record as urging its members to refrain from any violent act as these are wont to tarnish the conduct of elections with the country’s enemies pouncing on that and declaring such elections not free and fair to the detriment of Zimbabwe’s image abroad.

In the circumstances, will it be wrong to suggest that those political parties that have not publicly denounced violence in fact want to use violence to discredit the polls because they are aware of slim chances they stand in winning the elections?

If that is not so, what plausible justification have they for not joining the chorus by others against violence?

Come to think of it, political violence is an indictment of a political party or of parties over their failure to promote a high level of political culture among members to tolerate and co-exist with other rival political organisations.

What this failure also suggests is a lack of any effective political communication throughout the structures of a political party; otherwise members would realise that violence does incalculable harm, rather than good, to the entire standing of a political organisation.

But over and above this political violence is a sad commentary on a country’s immature political system where primitive methods are used to cow others in the race to acquire higher political stakes, whereas shiny track records should speak volumes for political parties that have done their homework.

Up until recently, Zimbabwe’s enemies must have been rubbing their hands together with glee as they watched what at first had appeared as an intractable impasse that had stalled compilation of a final draft of the new constitution, believing that Zimbabweans would be weakened and divided as a result.

But with that challenge over, the country’s enemies no doubt hope for and might somehow incite disorder to spoil the harmonised elections, even the referendum before that in order to lay their hand on Zimbabwe’s succulent political liver.

Some countries have said they will consider lifting the economic sanctions they imposed on this country after studying the conducts of the referendum and that of the harmonised elections themselves.

Now, are these countries not waiting to be influenced in their final decision on sanctions by political violence or its absence during both the referendum and the harmonised polls?

The onus is on Zimbabweans across the political divide to shame the devils with a peaceful conduct in the two voting processes and with that tell the world at large that our political system is on track in its maturation process.