By Gerald Tavengwa
For decades, the word “change” has echoed through Zimbabwe’s political landscape like a sacred mantra.
So potent is the concept that a major political party was even founded with the name Movement for Democratic Change.
“Change” is chanted at rallies, splashed across campaign posters, and whispered in hopeful conversations across every corner of the country.
Tragically, this promised “change” for the vast majority of Zimbabweans—queuing for a ration of unsafe water, scrounging for essential medicines, and watching their children’s futures evaporate—remains a cruel and perpetual illusion.
It is cynically manipulated by power-seekers disguised as national saviours.
The ugly truth that must be confronted is that the “change” peddled by many aspiring politicians is not about the systemic improvement of the masses’ standard of living and livelihoods.
It about their personal ascent.
A narrative carefully crafted and moulded to harvest votes and not solutions.
Change as Election Theatre
The most potent weapon in this political manipulation is the strategic distortion of time.
“Real change comes only at the election,” the politicians declare.
“Vote for us, endure the queues, the shortages, the crumbling infrastructure just a little longer, and salvation will arrive with the ballot count,” the politicians further emphasize.
Over the past decade this narrative serves a critical, self-preserving function, it conveniently absolves the powerful—both incumbent and aspiring—of any responsibility between electoral cycles.
It reduces the complex, urgent, and daily needs of a suffering nation to a single, often compromised, event.
It dictates to the mother walking kilometres for water that her desperation must wait for a political calendar to align.
The Musical Chairs of Power
Even when local elections appear to deliver new faces—councillors or Members of Parliament—the promised transformation rarely trickles down to the community.
The core reason is that the real levers of power, resources, and systemic control remain firmly entrenched, often insulated from local electoral shifts.
New councillors and MPs inherit bankrupt, broken, and opaque systems that are designed to fail the citizen.
But while the public system stalls, the individual politician finds rapid success.
The local councillor experiences change at a personal level, securing residential stands, patronage networks, and other benefits.
They can then vigorously chant the ‘change’ slogan at the next election, their personal success masking collective failure.
Similarly, new MPs enter a national assembly often sidelined by an all-powerful executive.
While the institution of Parliament may be weakened, the individual MP enjoys immediate “change” in their personal life which includes a new vehicle, fuel coupons, allowances, and a whole list of new luxuries that dramatically separate them from their constituents.
The “change” becomes merely a rotation of individuals within a fundamentally unchanging, predatory structure.
The water pipes remain rusted, the clinics empty, the jobs scarce—regardless of who holds the local or national title.
The Rigged Center and the Hollow Victory
The presidential election—the supposed pinnacle of “change”—exists in a realm of its own.
Allegations of manipulation, intimidation, and electoral engineering are not mere opposition complaints; they are a lived, painful reality for generations of Zimbabweans.
From Joshua Nkomo to Edgar Tekere, Margret Dongo, Morgan Tsvangirai, and Nelson Chamisa, many political figures have suffered the consequences of this deeply manipulated system.
But a deeper critique is required.
Even if an opposition candidate were to overcome these immense hurdles and secure the presidency, victory at State House does not automatically equal change for the masses.
The deep state, the entrenched patronage networks, the economic cartels, and the sheer inertia of a broken system present formidable barriers to genuine reform.
A new president may change the occupant of the top office, but without a powerful, active, and organised citizenry dismantling the underlying architecture of power and resource allocation, the people’s water doesn’t get cleaner, their cost of living doesn’t drop, and their dignity is not restored.
Change is Not an Event, it’s an Imperative
Zimbabweans do not need change someday, they need it now.
Clean water is not a campaign promise; it’s a fundamental human right needed today.
Functional healthcare isn’t a future aspiration; it’s a life-or-death necessity this very hour.
A viable economy isn’t a five-year plan; it’s the foundation for survival this month.
This is the change that matters—the change that cannot, and must not, be deferred until the next political cycle.
Reclaiming the Narrative: Change is a Daily Battle
Ironically, the powerful both those in office and those aspiring to it, want the ordinary masses to believe change is a passive act.
A cross on a ballot paper every five years.
This is a profound lie designed to disempower the citizenry.
The fact of the matter is that the very lasting change, that improves the quality of life which the ordinary masses yearn and crave for is for every single day.
On the streets, it’s the peaceful, organized demand for accountability.
Its communities coming together to fix a borehole, expose corruption in local procurement, or relentlessly demand better services from whoever holds local office today. It’s civic action holding feet to the fire.
In the courts, it’s using the law—however imperfect—to challenge injustice, protect rights, and demand consistent constitutional adherence.
In the community, it’s building local resilience, supporting one another, fostering entrepreneurship, and refusing to let despair win.
It’s about building the society you want from the ground up, brick by brick.
And yes, at the ballot, voting remains a crucial tool—but it is only one tool, not the entire toolbox.
Vote strategically, vote locally, and vote with your eyes wide open to the limitations of electoral politics alone.
Vote not because you believe one person on a podium is a messiah, but because it is one act of asserting your agency within a broader, relentless struggle.
The Masses should stop Waiting for the Mirage
Our nation’s salvation will not be delivered from on high after an election.
It will be forged in the daily courage of its people—in their refusal to accept dirty water as their fate, in their insistence on accountability every single day, in their relentless organization and demand for dignity.
Ordinary masses should not be seduced by the hollow chant of “change” from those seeking only a throne and personal glory.
As a people and a nation, we should now fight for real change—the kind that makes our taps flow with clean water, our hospitals functional, the sick healed, and our industries booming with adequate jobs for us to give our children a better future.
This good fight of ours begins in every street, every ward, and every social space.
Our better days and our hunger for a greater future cannot wait until the next political season.
Across our ten provinces, we—the masses—should demand, build, and be the “change” we all desire now.
We must clip the wings of this powerful systemic illusion that the power to reshape Zimbabwe begins at the ballot box alone.
On the contrary, the power to reshape our country for the betterment of every citizen lies in the unwavering, persistent will of its people.
Join the Zimbabwe Solidarity Movement and begin to fight for change on a daily basis.
Gerald Tavengwa is a Concerned citizen and member of the Zimbabwe Solidarity Movement who writes in his own capacity.
