The bane of approval addiction

Reason Wafawarova
IT is a bothersome reality that we have in our country politicians that cannot cope with divergent views, senior players in the political landscape who cannot stomach criticism, and leaders in our political parties who see enemies in anyone that does not join the praise-singing bandwagon of heedless boot-licking fanatics that are a vexatious lot in our polarised political sphere.

Charles Ray was one of the United States ambassadors to Zimbabwe, and this writer had no kind words for the man when he openly reduced himself to what looked like party level political activism in solidarity with the US-favoured MDC formations, especially the one led by Morgan Tsvangirai.

After reading some of the sharp criticism targeted at his name, Ambassador Charles Ray decided to engage this writer, and the initial question was, “Reason, can you explain who is the puppet and who is the puppeteer in this picture?”

This was after I had jokingly labelled a close friend who had been pictured with the ambassador a “puppet”. The friend in question was once a Director in Nelson Chamisa’s Organising Department at the MDC-T, before the now broke party retrenched him just after the gigantic July 31 loss to Zanu-PF, in the process shattering all hopes about some promised lofty public office position in something my friend always referred to as “the new Zimbabwe.”

This friend of mine had been pictured at an event where he had passionately praised the United States as “our world leader,” before going on to beg Ambassador Ray for “funding and direction in developing the Zimbabwean youths,” literally with hands clapping, and head on the pitiful side position.

I had what I believe to be an incisive debate with the Ambassador, and we grilled each other over among other issues, the US foreign policy in general, its sabre rattling approach to Zimbabwe in particular, police brutality in both Zimbabwe and the United States, democratic space as compared between the two countries, the MDC-T protest politics as opposed to policy politics, and so on and so forth.

After days of debating, the ambassador became a closer friend to me, like I believe I became to him, regardless of the fact that we hardly agreed on anything, and that our political views remain worlds apart.

In fact, the ambassador made a telling confession at the end of it all, indicating that he had found the engagement with me more beneficial than the many interactions he had had with some Zimbabweans who “somewhat blindly hold my country in unquestioned esteem,” adding “but I find your writing sometimes extremely polarising.” For all of Charles Ray’s shortcomings, the man is not an approval addict.

In stark contrast to the US ambassador’s approach, there are Australian political activists here who have time and again campaigned relentlessly for my deportation, who have avoided engaging me or debating me on matters of what I write, but have instead gone to the extent of starting a campaign for a possible trial at the ICC in The Hague, all on fictitious accusations that can only be described as ludicrous.

At one time a debate scheduled between South African intellectual Patrick Bond and me was abruptly cancelled after these dogmatic activists went on a hateful warfare against the hosting of the event.

It turned out that the rage was based on the assumption that I was going to use the debating platform to support “the Mugabe regime,” and that I was going “to justify Zimbabwe’s land grab,” and to vindicate “the regime” on its “brutality against the MDC and other progressive democratic forces.”

There is a particular enslavement in people that can best be described as approval addiction. It involves people living in bondage to what other people think of them, and it also involves an irrational craving for validity of one’s fixated opinion or view.

The Western view on Mugabe politics is a straitjacket created by the political elites and the mainstream media, and there is this addiction to Mugabe vilification that can only send the man’s critics into craziness if it is withdrawn for whatever reason.

When one becomes an addict to approval, no matter how much of this drug of choice one gets, they can never have enough. They will have to have more and more fixes and, like any other junkies, they can go crazy when the drug of choice is withheld.

One of the major causes of the political polarity that has traumatised Zimbabweans since the dawn of the millennium is the intolerance of the country’s political leaders, as well as the bigotry, prejudice and dogmatism of some fanatical supporters of the main political parties.

Some of our political leaders have openly derided anyone that does not approve of their leadership, threatened the perceived offenders, or victimised their critics.

We have to voice our concern over what appears to be Morgan Tsvangirai’s apparent addiction to approval — and the dire consequences that have been meted upon those perceived to be questioning the man’s leadership approval ratings.

Those in Zanu-PF factional politics will testify that blind and collective leadership approval for some powerful political giants within the party is a reliable survival tactic in the predatory political landscape upon which the party is gliding at the moment.

For failing to uphold the doctrine of unquestioned leadership approval to the factional don, one easily pays with their political career.

Party structures can easily be manoeuvred and manipulated just to eliminate those that fail the blind loyalty test, and it is a sad day in politics to see merit so subjugated by outrageous selfishness.

Writing in an opinion piece, the former MDC-T Director for Security, Chris Dhlamini had this to say about the party’s leader; “Tsvangirai’s leadership has been riddled with weakness, ineptitude, erroneous judgment and indecisiveness.”

He added, “For me, who has worked close to Tsvangirai for some years, I know his weaknesses and strengths at first hand. I know how much we have concealed for this man to portray him for what he is not. Take the example of violence.

“All commissions of violence have pointed at him and his close aides who have now come back to haunt this organisation. The split with Welshman Ncube and his team was partly influenced by this violent streak in this man.”

Hardly a week after Dhlamini penned his opinion piece, goons acting in the name of defending Morgan Tsvangirai savagely attacked Elton Mangoma, Promise Mkwananzi and Tendai Biti, right in the presence of Morgan Tsvangirai.

Solomon Madzore was marooned inside Harvest House, with bloody thugs baying for his blood outside.

A day after the attack, Morgan Tsvangirai collectively charged the four as “coup plotters,” who should be warned against “abusing my good character.”

The four are high-ranking office holders in the MDC-T, and their wrath-inviting crime is the perceived disapproval of Morgan Tsvangirai’s leadership qualities, well articulated in a letter written and confidentially passed on to the MDC-T leader by Elton Mangoma, the party’s deputy treasurer general. The letter constitutes a coup in the eyes of Tsvangirai, and his loyalty enforcement thugs dutifully meted their jungle justice on the offenders.

The letter raised pertinent questions on the MDC-T’s capacity to deliver under Tsvangirai, on alleged misuse of party funds and resources by Tsvangirai himself, on alleged corrupt dealings by the MDC-T leader during his tenure as prime minister in the ill-fated inclusive Government, and also on the scandalous matters “of women in your life,” a reference to Tsvangirai’s numerous sex related stories involving a disturbingly long list of women.

For his troubles Elton Mangoma has been vilified, threatened and eventually beaten up, alongside his perceived comrades in mischief.

Not even one of the issues raised in Mangoma’s letter has been addressed by Tsvangirai himself, or by any of his roguish supporters. What is being addressed is the person of Mangoma, not the content of his unpalatable input.

Douglas Mownzora and Nelson Chamisa are determined to shield their discredited leader from a pending pre-mature elective congress, a constitutional provision now deemed the “terms of the enemy,” simply because the idea was suggested by Elton Mangoma.

One is left wondering why Tsvangirai is against the idea of an early elective congress when his noisy supporters claim the man is immensely popular at grassroots level.

Tsvangirai certainly does not want to believe that he has squandered whatever integrity and clout he ever commanded in his eventful political career.

The man is so hopelessly addicted to the approval drug that anyone who disapproves of his political image has to be by definition part of Zanu-PF, or of the ever-blamed Central Intelligence Organisation.

Welshman Ncube, Job Sikhala, Gibson Sibanda, Priscilla Misihairabwi-Mushonga, Roy Bennet, Eddie Cross, Trudy Stevenson, Elton Mangoma and many others that have in the past disapproved of Tsvangirai’s leadership qualities from within the MDC have all been accused of being either Zanu-PF moles, or of furthering Zanu-PF’s “destabilisation agenda.”

Douglas Mwonzora’s explanation on the beating up of Mangoma and his colleagues was hilarious. He announced that the thugs at Harvest House had been sent by Zanu-PF.

These are the same youths who once tried to murder Trudy Stevenson, and at the time it was Chamisa who again said they had been sent by Zanu-PF, only to have Stevenson name them by their names as long time serving MDC activists.

The reported impunity of these thugs that relentlessly attack anyone seen as opposed to any of Tsvangirai’s actions is quite worrying. The party’s disciplinary authorities have time and again found Tsvangirai and his “kitchen cabinet” goons guilty of violence, and all punishments meted on the offending youths have been unilaterally overruled by Morgan Tsvangirai himself — in the process portraying himself as the mafia don that will protect murderers in pursuit of self interests.

One has to wonder what the man would do if he were to ever have control over armed men as Commander-in-Chief of the country’s defence forces.

Morgan Tsvangirai, like many others of his colleagues and counterparts in the country’s political landscape is hopelessly addicted to his drug of choice — blind approval. Like any other junky addict, he goes berserk whenever his drug of choice is withheld, and that is why Elton Mangoma and his like-minded are now game to Tsvangirai’s murderous goons.

Charlton Hwende has publicly threatened to die if Tsvangirai were to be removed from the leadership of the MDC-T, and the man vaingloriously hails the thuggish behaviour of Tsvangirai’s henchmen as a sign that the MDC-T leader has a “hold on grass root support.”

He is not alone in this delusion. Many MDC-T supporters in the diaspora cannot believe that the Tsvangirai they left in the early 2000s has transformed himself into a huge liability for his own party.

While the original MDC largely grew on protest politics against the excesses of Zanu-PF, some manufactured, some genuine; we now have a situation where Zanu-PF significantly relies on Tsvangirai’s pathetic ignorance of the political game for its survival, just like Chris Dhlamini outlined.

He wrote: “Zanu-PF is convinced that Morgan Tsvangirai’s ignorance is more than enough to give them everlasting political survival. President Robert Mugabe and Zanu PF now seem to believe that ruling in perpetuity can succeed on the basis of the weaknesses in the MDC under Tsvangirai’s leadership and not on the basis of the implementation of their own policies.”

We cannot allow this conceited trend where corruption, ineptness, and all manner of political evil are conveniently relegated to matters of conspiracies against esteemed political leaders simply because our leaders are now so addicted to the idea of approval that they choose to see or hear no evil. For the avoidance of doubt, this is across the political divide.

When approval diminishes for a once popular politician it is time to exist the political scene.

Fighting disapproval coming from one’s own people is as futile as trying to be taller at fifty, and surely no amount of violence is going to bring back lost credibility for Morgan Tsvangirai.

The thugs behind Tsvangirai’s quest for power are only validating every single shortcoming raised in Elton Mangoma’s letter — written and delivered in telling bravery and frankness, only to be met with cowardly barbarism so contrary to the MDC-T’s preached credo of democracy.

Zimbabwe we are one and together we will overcome. It is homeland or death!