After the Boycott, Organise to Defeat the Popular Front!

Robert Mugabe and Hu Jintao

The referendum on the new constitution was held on the 16th of March 2013 with only around 40% of eligible voters, after massive inflating of the figures , voting on the acceptability or otherwise of the draft written by the three parties in government together with their imperialist masters through UNDP. Over half of the eligible voters boycotted the referenda in a clear sign of protest to the GNU and the brutal policies of the three parties that have wrecked the lives of the ordinary poor and using the referendum to create the political basis for further attacks on the poor masses through brutal austerity measures demanded by imperialism.

Of those who voted about 94% were in support of the document with only about 5% rejecting it and the remainder filled by protest votes and/or spoiled votes. Even on this fraudulent basis the draft cannot be regarded as legitimate given the number of people who one way or the other saw through the tricks of the inclusive dictatorship and rejected the referendum farce. All the parties in the GNU have welcomed the results as historic and now calling for the entrenchment of constitutionalism i.e. acceptance of the culture of capitalist domination. Those calling for a No vote have rejected the outcome and vow to continue to oppose the constitution until a democratic and people driven one is in place.

For us the number of people who boycotted the process represents a latent social force in Zimbabwe of workers and the ordinary poor who are opposed to the policies of the current regime but with no clear solutions given the historical domination of reformism and centrism. The popular front regime has brought untold suffering to the people and this must end through smashing the regime and its social basis in order to conquer the interests of the ordinary poor. Workers, students, poor farmers, poor resident, unemployed and the informally employed must mobilise now for a UNITED FRONT to oppose the popular front regime that is now preparing to launch another round of attacks on the living conditions of the poor.

In our campaign for a boycott among workers, students, poor residents and the ordinary poor we reiterated the urgent need to launch a UNITED FRONT to spearhead the responses of the poor and exploited masses with the two meetings we convened endorsing the call. To that end the RWG (Zim) will be agitating and organising for the creation of local struggle committees in unions and struggle organisations to call for the convening of the UNITED FRONT of struggle organisations and individuals dedicated to the defeat of the policies being championed by the regime and those being proffered by those intending to replace the regime without replacing the capitalist basis. We congratulate the ordinary people of Zimbabwe for boycotting the referendum and now call upon them to organise to smash capitalism and its various local agents.

Revolutionary Workers Group-Zimbabwe

22 March 2013