via Ian Kay joins Bennett in MDC-T leadership change call by Jairos Saunyama for NewsDay September 23, 2013
MDC-T Marondera Central losing parliamentary candidate Iain Kay has joined the party’s exiled treasurer-general Roy Bennett in calling for leadership renewal within the Morgan Tsvangirai-led party.
“This is like a soccer team. If the coach continues losing, there is need for the technical board to sit down and deal with the issue,” Kay told NewsDay in an interview over the weekend.
“There is need to plan ahead before the ship sinks and if there is need to change the coach, then let it be. Or should I say it is like a rusty bolt? There is need for it to be removed and replaced with a new one rather than leave it like that,” he said without elaborating.
Two weeks ago, Bennett, who is in self-imposed exile in South Africa, torched a storm in the MDC-T after he openly challenged Tsvangirai to step down accusing him of failing to dislodge President Robert Mugabe in the past three elections including the just-ended race where he garnered a paltry 34% of the vote against the Zanu PF leader who got 61%.
Tsvangirai last week told journalists that he would step down only after being voted out at congress in 2016.
“I don’t intend to stay a day longer beyond my mandate, but I am not going to step down because a newspaper is saying I should step down or because Zanu PF is saying I should step down,” Tsvangirai said.
“If there is need for leadership renewal, we don’t suppress it; we actually encourage it. But you don’t just walk up in the streets and say Tsvangirai must go. There are processes that should be instituted and there are forums that will make that decision and one of those key forums is a congress. I was elected at a congress of party delegates in 2011 and the next congress is in 2016.”
COMMENTS
GO FOR 33 YEARS, ITS ALLOWED!
Bennet and Kay are free to form Rhodesia Front if that is what they want why is their call racially alligned they are part of the leadership that has ‘failed’ according to them why dont they practice what they are preaching by stepping down themselves? Hatizive vakakuroyayi endai munopengera ikoko
Let Benett be the President and Kay his Vice President. Come home Roy and prepare to takeover. You can’t tell frauded Zimbos that irrational talk in the comforts of Sandton when we know what happened. You left us to die, maimed and torchered while you go to sit pretty, thanks to the Diamonds you have been abusing for 10 years. Now yu want renewal before we even move out of the trenches. By the way, when did you come back to be MDC Roy when yu said if MDC lose I m stepping down; tell us you wwere kidding
He did not vote. If he is serious he must cross the Limpopo and join the rest in the struggle.
Muchatukana kusvika madhongi amera nyanga. Tsvangirai is there to stay until he wins the Presidential elections. No, until he dies because he is not going to win the elections in his life time on this planet when ZANU PF is still existing.
My Dear Ian and Roy,you are probably right by calling for leadership renewal..Its an open secret that Mdc team,which you are part of,has failed to take over power..Mdc yenyu yaora just like Ncube’s,all your political careers has come to an end
I do believe it is a debateable point, and I really cannot agree with tanyara muchatiguta that it has anything to do with forming a white party ie Rhodesian Front, or that it is racially motivated opinion as I have no doubt that a black person in the higher echelons of the party would step up to the post. I personally have very high regard for our president Morgan Tsvangirai and to say the least he has taken the heat, lost his wife, been beaten, arrested and his life threatened, but when it was clear that Mugabe was pushing his agenda as fast as he could Morgan knew he had the constitution and the signed document of the GNU behind him and he should have refused to go to the polls and then they would have had no credibility. BUT he did not and was too weak to call the shot, and we were beaten not by Mugabe, but by the Israelis the Chinese and the diamonds. They spent something like $800,000,000 of our coutries money to buy and cheat the election. Morgan may have to be the fall guy but no disrespect to a great man and if he continues I pray the Lord will bless his leadership.
MDC changed their own constitution to allow Morgan another shot at the Presidency. I wonder how long it will take Zimbabweans and the world at large to understand that Democracy is a modern political construct that has so far spectacularly failed in Africa. Indigenous populations still crave the attentions, patronage and praise of their “Chief”. Everything that has happened post independence in practically all African countries south of the Sahara has been about the re-institution of pre-colonial political systems. The cult of the personality. The big man. The Great African Dictator. By all means let us pay lip service to the “Democracy Show” so that we can continue to suckle on the breast of Western Aid agencies who are content to treat us like the little children we are to them.
It is all about indigenisation.
When the majority of Zimbabweans finally get to the point where they are ready to join the 21st Century and enjoy the benefits of a 21st Century Social Democratic political system where structures and policies take precedence over political personalities, then we may see our country fulfill it’s true potential.
Until then, we get exactly the governments we deserve. A pre-colonial feudal autocracy!
Aluta Continua.