A new political party, the Congress for Transformation (CFT), says it seeks to provide a sustainable alternative to Zimbabwe’s ever-deepening political and leadership crisis.
The new party members stated it was their moral obligation and duty to provide a “much-needed solution” to Zimbabwe’s economic meltdown, collapsed social services, distrust, unfaithfulness by government players, corruption, and erosion of fundamental values in those in positions of authority.
Referring to themselves as fighters, the leadership of CFT claimed the party was the vehicle that would use to deliver an alternative to the current political mess and social arena occupied by incompetent pretenders occupying the governance space, both as government and opposition.
“Their sole purpose of their existence is amassing power and its retention,” said the party’s Interim President, Godknows Sibanda over the weekend while announcing its launch.
Sibanda said Zimbabwe has for the longest time been in election mode, with total disregard for service delivery which people needed.
“Social services have suffered massive deterioration, with hospitals ill equipped, under-stocked with staff personnel whose morale is close to zero, schools infrastructure depleted, roads network infrastructure dilapidated, energy insecurity rising with a clueless government pertaining possible solutions. We witness a vicious tussle for power with local authorities, Parliament and the executive becoming a theatre of political fights that seem never ending.”
The party leader claimed CFT was “very genuine about solving Zimbabwe’s crisis and was not a fraud.”
“We are not here to lie to you or to Zimbabweans. We want a total revolution that is going to see the emancipation of our people. This is 2023, however, Zimbabwe, is far behind in decades, compared with other neighbouring countries. Look at Zambia, it had its own issues but has managed to transcend beyond those issues. We can’t even compare South Africa, however, not so long ago we were able to compete on many aspects of the economy. So the question is, are we going to fold our hands and do nothing? Definitely not,” he said.
“People are still disappearing, which is an extension of Gukurahundi. Recently an MP was abducted. We see the conflation between a political party and the State. We see a continued abuse of our Constitution. What are we saying about that? This is a space that needs to be filled.”
Sibanda added that if President Emmerson Mnangagwa insists on ignoring pleas by Zimbabwans, he would “find himself obviously in trouble because we are not going to fold our hands.”
CFT interim deputy secretary general, Bongani Halimana Ndlovu, said although the party has not gone for its Congress, it had its founding documents in place which were produced after a meeting of its conveners across our country.
“I can say in about 70 percent of our country we have put solid branches that we call roots and have structures in what we call regions. The idea for this party was conceived well before elections, but the movement was born on September 1, 2023,” he said.
“Before congress, we will actually go to a policy conference. And the delegates will sit and deliberate the documents in those founding documents. Then we move on to the next entire process which is the elective Congress.”
CFT spokesperson, Iphithule Maphosa added that CFT members draw inspiration from their previous and different political platforms where they had been particularly ZAPU.
“Our ideology is to the left, we are socialists in nature. We believe the means production should be accessible to everyone regardless of their social status. We believe access to those resources should be unhindered in any way,” he said.
Maphosa explained that CFT was coming into the political scene now because it wanted time to mobilise people before it could run for political office.
“We are in an environment where unfortunately we find there are people who think they need to personalise and ring fence politics, the government included. If you look at the nomination fees that were ring fencing that space for the rich and elite. We also have an opposition party that has a tendency of trying to close out other players in that space, “ he said.
“So we deliberately avoided launching before the elections, so that we don’t present ourselves as some organisation after votes. We deliberately let the election pass so that we come at a time where we expect not to be voted for or to gain any political powers but that we can have enough time to mobilise people by the time we get to the next election we have a fully conscious electorate that understands our ideology and aspirations .”
