Boniface Mwabukusi just wrapped up the Tanganyika Law Society (TLS) presidency with a comfortable margin of over 400 votes pimping his closest rival, Sweetbert Nkuba, who doubles as CCM Kahama district NEC representative. Mr. Nkuba is unhappy with his loss and has promised to file his complaint in court.
The way Mwabukusi won got my attention, and I began to visualise whether he could stitch up the gulf that had splintered the opposition into a losing outfit. The opposition needs an inspiring leader they can trust and unite them for a shared cause of sending CCM home.
Read Related: Reinstated Candidate Boniface Mwabukusi Spurs Renewed Hope for Tanganyika Law Society
For most opposition leaders eyeing the presidency, the challenge is to bury their differences and seek a loftier national cause. In other words, are their differences more significant than their petty personal ambitions? This article examines the hidden dynamics that will shape how the opposition positions itself in the general election of 2025.
Mwabukusi certainly has the momentum, but he has ascertained very few options so far. This discourse urges him to think BIGGER: go after the presidency and leave the Mbeya Urban parliamentary politics to former MP Joseph Osmund Mbilinyi (Mr Sugu) to wriggle out of the seat from the Speaker of the House, Dr. Tulia Ackson.
I am cognizant that Mr. Mwabukusi has a political future in this country, and that future is not in CCM. His abrasive brand of politics happens to be untenable in CCM. These days, CCM is a playground of plaudits who read and trumpet beauty and sanity even where there is darkness and a slippery path.
Mwabukusi is now uniquely placed to unite opposition factions whose power struggles have stratified them into a war from within. Such standoffs have seen election losers jump to CCM and spend time “naming and shaming” their former leaders.
If you ask yourself why Reverend Peter Msigwa left Chadema, it is not about policy differences but a protest against an internal election bungle. Msigwa’s main complaint is that he was rigged out in favour of Mr. Sugu.
Also read Chadema’s Internal Strife: A Constitutional Crisis Threatens Party Unity
Tundu Lissu, too, decried money being used to buy leadership in Chadema. The only person whose silence mattered most was Chadema Chairman Mr. Freeman Mbowe.
I say so because the Chairman of any political party worthy of his name should have been irked by complaints of internal elections marred by accusations of bribery and rigging. Chadema has yet to conduct an internal inquiry to arrest what went wrong in those elections. A “do nothing” decision has polarized Chadema, wedging it even more.
There are now two demarcations inside Chadema, one belonging to Mbowe and the other to Lissu. Their differences can be traced to who will be anointed to be their presidential flag bearer in 2025.
Based on the results of the just-ended elections, Mr. Mbowe’s faction was the biggest beneficiary, whose allies bagged many top positions in the party. Mr. Mbowe’s allies in the central committee will hold four aces to coronate who will gun down the presidency in 2025. There is a big dilemma over this.
Tundu Lissu’s camp feels cheated in the concluded elections, and the electoral injustices have made the coronation of Mbowe a matter of time rather than a question of the ballot box since the votes are known even before they are cast.
My crystal eyeball informs me that Reverend Msigwa was on Tundu Lissu’s embattled camp and was rigged out. It is important to note that these elections also picked members of the central committee indirectly.
If one loses the regional chairperson for obvious reasons, he cannot be a member of the Politburo. Most election winners belong to Mr Mbowe’s political tent, which paved the way for his presidential nomination, leaving Mr Lissu to pick up the pieces.
Will Tundu Lissu Surrender Without a Fight?
As the political situation stands in Chadema, Lissu has two options: go with the flow and support Mr. Mbowe for the presidency or join the most likely political party of ACT Wazalendo.
The problem for the opposition is that once divided, they will collectively lose to CCM. Neither Tundu Lissu nor Mbowe can unify the opposition. There must be a new candidate not contaminated with Chadema’s internal infighting—someone who may win ACT Wazalendo under Zitto Kabwe.
Zitto Kabwe may not hold any position in ACT Wazalendo, but he is the de facto leader of that political entity. Both Lissu and Mbowe no longer have that e-factor. The latter never had it at all during his political career. Lissu has seen his political fortunes dwindling because his political nemesis, former president the late Dr. John Pombe Magufuli, is no longer on the scene.
It is debatable whether Lissu would have caught voters’ imaginations if he had not attacked Magufuli’s shaky performance as infrastructure minister. It is also doubtful that he would have garnered political sympathy if Mr. Lissu had survived the assassination.
But time has moved on, and Africans are quick to turn the page without seeking retribution. Having that hindsight, we are done with Lissu, whose political clout diminished without having a parliamentary platform where his legal and debating skills impressed many.
Lissu has been on the campaign trail, but his critical style has failed to excite us largely because President Samia Suluhu Hassan is not as combative as Magufuli was. It is difficult to win a sabre rattling when the other side is not engaging you.
Magufuli loved to respond to Lissu’s roadside broadsides. For instance, in the 2020 elections, Lissu claimed “Wamachinga” were taken for a ride over business permits. Magufuli hit him back, and the public took notice.
Today, Lissu questions many government policies and decisions, but nobody joins the chorus. Over time, his relevance is diminished, and based on all the aforementioned factors, the opposition needs to look outside the duo: Lissu and Mbowe.
Mbowe had many opportunities to claim national attention but has failed to lead by example. He could have retired and let others run Chadema. No, he has reduced it to his business entity. Of all the issues about Zitto Kabwe on political party management, he has fared better than most.
He understood that power, like water in the palms of the hands, is elusive. If you squeeze it, it just trickles between the fingers, but if you hold it without squeezing, it stays in your hands. Kabwe has never wanted to be the chairperson of ACT Wazalendo but was a party leader, and now he has retired, leading from afar.
All other leaders in the opposition have a lot to learn. You do not need to be everywhere pulling the strings without stepping on the shoes of many. This is where Mbowe unintentionally disqualified himself to be Mr. President. Many regard him as a power monger and a narcissistic person unfit for national leadership, where humility and vision are the basic qualities.
Read Related: Freeman Mbowe Has a Valid Point to be Heard, But Where Is the Truth?
Indeed, Mwabukusi Can Break The Opposition’s Ice
Although Mwabukusi does not seem to have presidential ambitions, he should because this is an hour of reckoning. His stand against leasing Dar es Salaam port was taken through legal channels.
Also, Mwabukusi, since he is a professional in the private sector, not tainted with scandals or siding with any of the opposition leaders, stands out to dissolve the differences that have constrained the opposition from doing well in elections. I say so because I anticipate less electoral fraud in this election than the last one, despite minor twists and turns in the election law.
My question to the opposition is, how much do you despise CCM’s prolonged stay in power that you may coalesce around a new political greenhorn in Mwabukusi?
If they place self-interest before national ones, they will lose individually. Voters know that next year’s election’s stakes are very high, and the policy choices are clear. CCM is rudderless in managing and maximising our human resources, so they outsource it from the aliens and heavy borrowing, costing us jobs, taxes, skills, and living standards, routing our national pride.
The opposition can counter that with policies that put our human resources at the centre, rejecting borrowing, living within our means, and investing heavily in agricultural machinery and local industries.
Can the opposition stand up and be counted, or continue squandering opportunities to prop up the same failed hands daily?
