The Sunday News
Meluleki Moyo
I NEVER subscribed to the notion that there is a possibility of having a lookalike somewhere in the global village until I stumbled on Africa’s political doubles called Raila Odinga and Morgan Tsvangirai.
The embattled political cry-babies have a very striking resemblance regarding among other similarities, perpetual defeat in elections, inconsistency in policy and allegiance and as symbols of instability added to boasting of a long and lengthy experience in their opposition political journeys to nowhere.
For those considering pursuing studies in political catastrophe, when thoroughly critiqued, the Odinga-Tsvangirai case is rich and quite infectious, trust me.
A doppelganger is a lookalike or double of a living person. The word is often used to describe any person with a striking physical or behavioural resemblance to another person. Doppelgangers were in some cultures generally considered as omens of bad luck. Seeing one’s own doppelganger was said to be an omen of death.
In some ancient cultures, doppelgangers were referred to as “evil twins” suggesting that they could even provide misleading and malicious advice to the person they shadow. They could even plant sinister ideas in their victim’s mind to cause them great confusion and suffering. For this reason, people were advised to avoid contact with their own doppelganger at all costs.
Failure to learn from the past and sharing the same ideologies, Tsvangirai and Odinga have been very close acquaintances. A very dangerous union for doppelgangers.
While Morgan was deep in political slumber, Odinga tried to play kingmaker, pretending to be in solidarity yet he only expected to be given a voice in Zimbabwe’s political matters at the expense of Tsvangirai, something he was starved of in his native Kenya. Luckily, when Tsvangirai woke up from the siesta, he refused to give him a consultancy seat to his government, before he retired to his usual political slumber.
On academic philanthropy grounds, I pardon Tsvangirai. I put into cognisance his very disadvantaged academic background, unlike his Kenyan double who holds an MSc (Master of Science) in Mechanical Engineering and probably a master at destroying his shadows.
Surrounded by ill-advisors, Tsvangirai failed to realise he was exposing himself to the snares of his malicious double. When Tsvangirai allowed Odinga to address his supporters at the MDC Bulawayo Congress in 2011 and when he attended his son, Fidel Odinga’s funeral in 2015, he exposed his back. I am sorry to say this but Tsvangirai was being lured to his political grave. He just had to avoid contact and communication with his doppelganger.
Oh poor Tsvangirai! That was a trap, you just had to run, run and run!
Odinga’s recent election loss to president-elect and incumbent Uhuru Kenyata, and probably his last contest, explicitly highlights the times ahead for Tsvangirai. Tsvangirai’s demise is imminent as he, like a fly continues to follow the Kenyan political corpse to the grave.
It has never rained but poured for the former Prime Ministers who as well double as Africa’s most experienced opposition figures. As fate would have it, both ceased to be Prime Ministers in their respective countries in 2013. Their political lives have been coupled with splits inducing dissent from within their parties, added to frustration, with both having failed to secure the longed for job; the presidency.
Possessing revolutionary genes, being born to Jaramogi Oginga Odinga who once saved as Jomo Kenyatta’s vice-president, Raila Odinga had arguably amassed some following in independent Kenya. Sadly, his flip flopping and inconsistency in policy and allegiance has confused his followers. This has heralded in gross dwindling in his support base, a very similar situation in Tsvangirai’s still-fragmenting MDC.
In a clear demonstration that there is nothing super about coalitions, especially in literate nations, Odinga and his National Super Alliance recently garnered 44.7 per cent of the votes. This was nowhere near the incumbent’s 54,2 percent, dismissing any hopes of another power sharing deal, that common solace for losing opposition parties in Africa.
Demonstrating political inconsistency and in gross political prostitution like Tsvangirai, Odinga has changed political allegiance a record times. Being identified with the Forum for the Restoration of Democracy, Forum for the Restoration of Democracy-Kenya, National Development Party, Kenya African National Union, Liberal Democratic Party and the Orange Democratic Movement.
He has also been affiliated with the Coalition for Reforms and Democracy and the National Super Alliance (NASA) which has arguably put the final nail on his political coffin.
In similar fashion, before disowning the revolutionary genes, Tsvangirai was a member of the Zimbabwe African National Union Patriotic Front (Zanu-PF) to 1999 before falling on the wayside, advocating for a reversal of the gains of the liberation struggle, co-founding the Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) in 1999, a movement which thrived up to 2005 before he identified himself with the Movement for Democratic Change-Tsvangirai (MDC-T).
Currently, Tsvangirai is fronting a coalition and as in the case of his Kenyan double, this coalition will arguably hammer the final nail on his political coffin, on its way to lie side by side his Kenyan doppelganger in the political cemetery.
Like his Kenyan double who, before accepting a half loaf in 2008, lost consecutively in 1997, 2007, and 2013 and recently losing to Uhuru Kenyatta for the second time, Tsvangirai lost to President Mugabe in 2002, 2008 and 2013. What followed were an array of consequences of a bitter and a heartbroken soul. The frustration was further and is still spiralling down to his unfortunate subordinates.
Tsvangirai has arguably divided political opinion. Those suffering from “Morganmania” and found wanting in the balances of honesty may choose to view him as a democrat who has sacrificed a lot in his fight against the so called human rights abuses but those suffering from “Morganphobia” see him as a scheming and a very selfish individual who will do anything to gain the dearly longed for power, and can be justified.
Recently, one of his deputies, Thokozani Khuphe and other senior members of his MDC-T outfit, were left nursing an array of pains which required some urgent medical attention, allegedly inflicted on Tsvangirai’s orders at the backdrop of his already doomed coalition endeavour.
Added to advocating for the imposition of economic sanctions, at the turn of the new millennium, Tsvangirai set out to remove a democratically elected Zanu-PF government from power through unconstitutional means, and in his words: “What we would like to tell Mugabe today is that please go peacefully. If you don’t want to go peacefully, we will remove you violently”. This has been followed by untold sabotage which has included urging workers and citizens to “shut down Zimbabwe”.
On the other hand, his jailbird double who spent six years of his political career in detention after an unsuccessful attempt to overthrow President Daniel Arap Moi in 1982, recently echoed similar sentiments, seemingly oblivious of his political setting sun. Speaking from heaps of rubbish while addressing excited supporters at a rubble and rubbish strewn wasteland in Kibera, Nairobi’s largest slum which also happens to be his stronghold, Odinga vowed to “remove” Kenyatta’s government from power before urging his supporters to boycott work.
Refusing to accept that coalitions of nonentities do not work, still trying to come together, being led by Odinga’s double while awaiting their final and imminent demise due in 2018, that heart-breaking and unfortunate Odinga experience, Zimbabwe opposition in sixes and sevens, have spent most of their time clamouring for electoral and other reforms.
Unfortunately, utholukuthi hey, it’s a waste of precious campaign time which has apparently run out!
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