Political Reporter

Citizens Coalition for Change (CCC) members are not happy with the proposed criteria to elect party leadership and have accused their leader Nelson Chamisa of ignoring the tenets of democracy.

A CCC member who spoke to this publication said that the majority of the membership was not in support of Chamisa’s plot to handpick his preferred leaders at the expense of those wanted by the grassroot supporters. The source said that CCC as a democratic party, should conduct elections from the cell up to the national level to afford members a chance to freely elect their preferred leaders.

“The majority of party members are not in support of what Mahere (Fadzayi) said last week. Mahere claimed that the party was consulting its grassroots members on who their preferred leaders should be. That is a lie. No one is being consulted. However, we have heard that there is a plot to impose leaders on the people and then claim that they were chosen by the people after a consultation process,” said the source.

The source added that the CCC was slowly morphing into an undemocratic institution as all leaders are not substantive and there is no hope of holding an elective congress anytime soon to correct this anomaly.

“What we are seeing in CCC is a strange way of doing politics. Where have you seen a party shunning an elective congress. I was aiming for a national post within CCC but I don’t think it will materialise as there is a plot to reward the president’s (Chamisa) close circle with party positions. Some of us who are not well known to the president (Chamisa) will continue languishing in the peripherals of the party,” added the source.

Last week in an interview, CCC spokesperson said that the CCC was embarking on a new process of electing its leaders thereby possibly ditching the traditional congresses.

Meanwhile, political commentator Professor Jonathan Moyo has warned CCC that it risks being torn apart unless it goes for an elective congress to elect substantive leaders.