Chronicle EditorChronicle Writer
CITIZENS Coalition for Change (CCC) acting president, Professor Welshman Ncube, says beleaguered former party leader, Mr Nelson Chamisa’s strategic ambiguity is solely to blame for the chaos and confusion that engulfed the party before and after last year’s elections leading to the infamous recalls of elected representatives.
Mr Chamisa later dumped the opposition outfit following his defeat in the Presidential race amid accusations of leadership failure, which further plunged his party into a crisis.
Prof Ncube said the strategic ambiguity approach by Mr Chamisa took party members by surprise and rendered everyone within the party without any position but mere onlookers except Mr Chamisa who even called himself the “champion in chief”.
In a wide-ranging interview on Tuesday evening with Skyz Metro FM, Prof Ncube also claimed that Senator Sengezo Tshabangu, who instigated the recalls of elected party members was never elected an interim secretary general of the party but took advantage of the “strategic confusion” to pronounce himself one.
“Over and above that, as we headed for the August 2023 elections, there was already serious confusion within the party as to who held what position and who did not hold any position,” said Prof Ncube.
“This other day we will wake up having Advocate Fadzai Mahere as the spokesperson and the next day it will be Mr Promise Mkhwananzi, all this under the animal, which they called ‘strategic ambiguity’.
“This is what caused all this confusion, which ended up giving birth to an interim secretary known as Tshabangu, people that we never elected to those positions as party members,” said Prof Ncube.
He bemoaned the dearth of a vibrant democratic opposition in the country saying institutions like political parties were critical as they provide members of Parliament, Senate and Cabinet.
“It’s our view that there must be a democratic opposition that will show that even before coming into power, how democracy works, how people must decide their own leadership at whatever level so that people will have confidence that once you are in power, you will respect the will of the people and all democratic tenets as they are known.
Opposition political parties must practically show being democratic,” said Prof Ncube. In the case of Mr Chamisa’s CCC, he said no one knew what was happening under strategic ambiguity, adding that even those who claimed to be part of the plan, did not know what they were talking about.
“They were saying this strategic ambiguity was to confuse Zanu-PF so that it doesn’t dribble past or cheat us but look now, it is that which has led to recalls yet we were told that it was meant to foolproof against any machinations from Zanu-PF yet yazingenela igijima iZanu-PF,” he said.
Prof Ncube said they were now busy with restructuring of the party in preparation for the elective congress with the hope of remedying the structureless party. He would not give exact dates.
“After this critical exercise, we will then take the party back to the people for them to then elect their leaders of choice and hopefully those who will be elected won’t make the same fatal mistakes we did like allowing this strategic ambiguity animal, which devoured the party,” he said.
CCC was formed in January 2022 by a national council that was elected on an MDC-Alliance ticket at a Gweru congress in 2019 following disagreements with other organs of the MDC-Alliance, said Prof Ncube.
This followed the chaotic aftermath of the 2018 elections that resulted in a Supreme Court order for the then MDC-Alliance component, which was originally MDC-T, to go back and hold their congress as leadership disputes raged on.
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