Did Chamisa win one million more votes than his MPs?

It is almost a week since the Constitutional Court dismissed Movement for Democratic Change Alliance leader Nelson Chamisa’s court case in which he sought to have Emmerson Mnangagwa’s victory in the 30 July elections invalidated.

Chamisa not only rejected the court’s verdict but he also claimed that he won the elections with 2.6 million votes.

The Zimbabwe Electoral Commission gave him 2.1 million votes.

The MDC national council met yesterday and resolved that Chamisa had won the elections by 2.6 million votes and was therefore the legitimate president of Zimbabwe.

If Chamisa won 2.6 million votes, this means that he got almost one million more votes than his legislators as they got 1.6 million votes.

While former MDC leader Morgan Tsvangirai always polled more votes than his legislators combined even in 2008 when they won more seats than the Zimbabwe African National Union-Patriotic Front, the gap was never that wide.

Mugabe, on the other hand, never won more votes than ZANU-PF legislators combined. This was also the case with Mnangagwa though the gap was much narrower with legislators getting only about 17 000 more votes.

The MDC national council said the party will consult Zimbabweans across the country about the way forward with regards to the “stolen election” and thereafter embark on a national programme of action resulting from the outreach.

The MDC will put into effect an earlier resolution to integrate Alliance partners back into the MDC, the council said, and will engage in rallies to thank the 2.6 million people that voted for Chamisa.

What remains unanswered is that if the MDC has evidence that Chamisa won 2.6 million votes, why did it not present this evidence in court instead of dwelling on figures that seemed to dispute that Mnangagwa did not win an outright victory?

This is what Chief Justice Luke Malaba insisted the court wanted, evidence, though Chamisa’s supporters like Jonathan Moyo are now twisting his words to insist that he wanted facts not figures.

Chamisa, who is now saddled with a huge legal bill, now wants to take the case to the African Commission on Human and People’s Rights.

He defended his stance in an interview with the Voice of America. Below is an audio of the interview.

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