Harare, Zimbabwe (News of the South) – The ruling ZANU-PF party is holding rural voters hostage by withholding title deeds to land and using the threat to take the land to draw supporters, a political analyst has said.
Dr Alex Magaisa a former advisor to Morgan Tsvangirai says the rural economy revolves around land and the fact that ZANU PF took land from white commercial farmers and gave some of it to rural peasants means there are thousands of rural households who have a strong attachment to ZANU PF.
“Ironically, since the new land occupiers have no title to the land and can be easily removed, loyalty to the party is the mortgage they must pay in order to keep the land”.
“But ZANU PF also knows when to throw gifts and trinkets related to land, such as seed and fertiliser, all of which remind the peasants that the party “cares” for them”.
Magaisa says the opposition needs to come up with alternatives to the ZANU-PF narrative so as to draw the voters to their side.
“To conquer the rural areas, the dynamics of this rural economy must be understood”.
“The opposition must offer an alternative and believable alternative to the peasants”
“Acknowledging that ZANU PF does have a core of support based mainly in the rural areas does not mean that it has exclusive control of those areas”
Magaisa who is a law lecturer at Kent University in the UK said “not everyone is indebted to ZANU PF” .
“If everyone was loyal, ZANU PF would not resort to strategies of intimidation, violence, instilling fear and other control methods”.
“The rigging thesis has been used to explain ZANU PF’s apparent dominance in the rural areas. Nevertheless, how this rigging takes place is often described in general and vague terms”, he said.
Turning to the issue of election observation, Magaisa says the current model isn’t proper as it has loopholes that allow for unfair elections to be passed off as free and fair.
“Election observers often arrive a few weeks before the elections and leave soon after”
“It is during that period that the conduct of political actors is scrutinised. Whether or not elections are free and fair depends on what happens during this limited period”
“In my experience, this is a flawed model of judging whether or not elections are free and fair. It is a flawed model of assessing whether or not there is rigging”, he said.
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