“Mugabe and the senior echelons of Zimbabwe’s military share a
nationalist liberation ideology wrought during the fight for independence from
white rule during the 1960s and 1970s. Mugabe and ZANU-PF have carefully
maintained and updated this ideology to fit changes in the political climate,”
wrote Alexander Noyes, a Senior Associate at the Centre for Strategic and
International Studies.
What ideology is Noyes talking about?
Before independence and a few decades after; Mugabe had talked
about the black nationalist ideology with the confidence and conviction of one has
drunk and bathed in the distant lake. But after 37 years of corrupt and
tyrannical rule, the Zanu PF ideology and all it had promised have all turned
out to be a mirage.
Robert Mugabe himself would be chuffed to bits to read that
there is someone out stupid enough to still believe in the mythical Zanu PF
ideology. Mugabe would only be too glad to fund Noyes’ studies and wider
circulation of his finding for no other reason than to help spruce the tyrant’s
soiled reputation!
An honest study, can comb through all Mugabe has ever said and
done (his is the only voice ever heard in Zanu PF, everyone else has been no
more than a duckling programmed to follow his lead, no questions asked) in
search of this Zanu PF nationalism liberation ideology. All one will find is a commitment
to defeat the white colonial regime at all cost. The war of liberation has
costed the nation dearly in lost treasure, human suffering and human lives and,
worst of all, it allowed the power-hungry but intellectually challenged minions
to get into power.
After independence Mugabe pursued his “scientific” socialism
insisting it would transform the country into this idyllic Marxist – Maoist utopia
with guaranteed mass prosperity, “gutsa ruzhinji”, as Mugabe promised. The test
of the pudding is in the eating. After 37 years of Zanu PF gross mismanagement
and rampant corruption we have mass poverty instead of the promised mass
prosperity.
In 1980 Zimbabwe was one of the richest countries in African
with potential to do even better. Today Zimbabweans are the poorest in Africa.
So, what went wrong with Mugabe’s “scientific socialism”?
The two threads that has ran through all Mugabe’s bankrupt “scientific
socialism” are the regime’s insatiable appetite and its reckless spending. No
one has ever prospered from reckless spending; ask the prodigal son!
Mugabe’s resolve to defeat the white colonial regime at all cost
was matched by his post-independence resolve to stay in power at all cost. Zanu
PF has ridden roughshod over the people’s freedoms and human rights including
the right to free, fair and credible elections and even the right to life. 1980
marked the end of the civil war to end white colonial rule and the beginning of
new ruthless fight to impose Zanu PF political domination.
Mugabe has used Zanu PF youths and women’s league members, the
first two decades, and thereafter by the rogue war veterans; to harass, beat
and rape to intimidate and silence Zanu PF opponents and to coerce the public
to vote for the party. The Army, Police and CIO have carried out the heavy
stuff of political murders. Over 30 000 innocent Zimbabweans have been murdered
in cold blood to establish and retain the de facto Zanu PF one-party
dictatorship.
It was none other than Mugabe himself who has encourage the
culture of political violence, vote rigging and lawlessness. He has corrupted
the Police, Judiciary, ZEC and other State Institutions forcing them to promote
Zanu PF’s no-regime-change mantra in violation of their statutory duties of upholding
the rule of law, etc.
Whatever pretentions Mugabe had of being guided by some
political and/or economic ideology have all been washed away; leaving behind a
despot, incapable of holding any discernible ideology, whose whole life is
governed by his insatiable and primeval greed for power and wealth.
“In 2000, ZANU-PF faced its first real political threat in the
rise of the Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) opposition party. In response,
ZANU-PF linked resistance to imperialism in the 19th century to
the war of liberation in the 1970s and the expropriation of white-owned land in
the early 2000s to reward war veterans. This updated
ideology promotes a view of Zimbabwe’s politics as a struggle between
revolutionary “patriots” (liberation war veterans) and “sell-outs” (the
opposition),” continued.
“This ideology continues to run deep in the
senior levels of Zimbabwe’s military. It is the glue that binds Mugabe to his
generals and thereby lessens the likelihood of a military coup as long as
Mugabe is president.”
To suggest that the people of Zimbabwe are still fooled by
Mugabe and Zanu PF lies, propaganda and damned lies that the regime still cares
about them is an insult to every thinking Zimbabwean. The people of Zimbabwe
would have booted the regime out of office many, many moons ago if the regime
was not rigging elections.
The very fact that the regime’s damned lies even have any
traction with ill-informed individuals like Noyes is because the MDC have
failed to articulate a counter narrative to debunk the propaganda. Worse still,
it is the MDC’s failure to implement the democratic reforms designed to stop
Zanu PF rigging the elections that has allowed the tyrant’s reign to last this
far.
It is the looted wealth that has helped Mugabe keep his greedy
but wasteful Zanu PF thugs in party and security services united this far.
However, the country’s worsening economic meltdown not only affected the
ordinary people, even those in the regime’s ruling elite inner most circle have
not been spared. It is the fear of poverty that is fuelling the dog-eat-dog tearing
Zanu PF apart as member fight over the dwindling wealth.
It was worsening economic situation that force Mugabe to “baby
dump” former VP Joice Mujuru and hundreds of her supporters. It was the regime’s
failure to pay the rogue war veterans’ children’s fees, their pension and other
allowances that forced the rogues to confront Mugabe and demand his departure
from office.
If the person who takes over from Mugabe can guarantee the top
brass in the security services their present lifestyles there will never be
coup in Zimbabwe. Zanu PF ideology is the glue holding the party together. Yeah
right! What does General Chiwenga know or care about ideology!
What Zanu PF and security sector buffoons like Chiwenga have
failed to grasp, even now with all the evidence before them, is that the corrupt
and tyrannical Zanu PF dictatorship is economically and politically unsustainable.
The party is imploding and the country must dismantle the dictatorship if it is
not the dragged into the abyss with the party.
6 comments:
Kenya’s election took an ominous turn on Wednesday as violent protests erupted in the capital and elsewhere after opposition leader Raila Odinga alleged fraud, saying hackers used the identity of a murdered official to infiltrate the database of the country’s election commission and manipulate results.
This is sad for the people of Kenya and Africa at large. Are we really incapable of self-governing? We cannot agree on what constitute free, fair and credible elections; sit down and come up with a electoral system that will deliver it?
What makes Zimbabwe's case so disappointing is we start with an electoral system which we all know will never deliver free, fair and credible elections. SADC leaders have helped us come up with the list of reforms we need to implement to ensure free and fair elections. We had five years to implement the reforms but failed to get even one reform implemented.
SADC leaders have warned of the folly of contesting the elections with no reforms in place - Zanu PF will rig the vote. Again, we refused to listen.
It is mid-summer madness to contest a flawed election knowing it will be rigged!
“African nations are among the worst sufferers of all three in the world – poverty, low education standards and internal division. They are therefore at most risk to repressive, self-seeking governments that have little interest in getting their subjects out of poverty, and it explains why these are still the norm so long after colonialism ended,” wrote David Barber.
If we had good leaders we would have never had the Zanu PF dictatorship in the first place. The fact that is has lasted all these 37 years goes to show we also lack quality opposition leaders.
Very interesting David but if one was to assume that of the three factors - poverty, low education standards and internal divisions – low education standard is the main factor; are you saying Zimbabweans with all our high literacy rate and leaders with seven University degrees and a wife so smart she got a PhD in three months, etc.; we have still not attained the same level as the Greeks 2 500 years ago. The Greeks had the more difficult task of devising democracy, we only need to copy it and yet cannot do even that!
We sure have a government and opposition we deserve, that much is clear!
The only two things President Mugabe has remained faithful to in all his life is his love for power and wealth. Zimbabwe could have become the South Korea of Africa but has become the North Korea of Africa instead.
Mugabe has ruled Zimbabwe with an iron fist, we have so many CIOs it is no exaggeration to say Mugabe has the whole nation on a leash.
It is therefore the ideology of the loot and fear that has help President Mugabe stay in power.
I agree it is the loot that has held Zanu PF together all these years, as the nation's wealth started to drop, party members have grown increasingly restless. The white owned farms was the last valuable loot President Mugabe had left to give away. Ever since njambanja thugs took over the last farm, the tyrant has really struggled to keep discipline in the party.
The "baby dumping" of Mujuru and her followers was meant to ease the pressure and make those left feel they would now have a share of the loot. The cake has been shrinking so fast that even if the party was to "load shed" another half of the party those left will be well fed!
Zanu PF is imploding and it is the economic meltdown that is fuelling it!
The war veterans are taking the factional war right up to President Mugabe's door. “Control your children first. Grace a failed mum; her sons unruly rogues failing only with two boys, can’t mother 14 million,” reads the message on the T-shirt that Matemadanda proudly wore.
It is all out war and both Zanu PF factions know there no holds barred and neither side is taking prisoners! This is a kill or be killed war, prisoners are cumbersome burden one can ill afford.
In the TV series House of Card the American President is seen expressing his anger with Israel for bribing Zimbabwe’s dictator to help block America’s plan.
Israel siding with a brutal African dictator is not something farfetched from reality!
Whoever wrote that script must have heard of NIKUV, the Israeli company, that has been helping President Mugabe rig elections. The Israeli government has been warned by none other than the West of NIKUV’s obnoxious and criminal activities and the regime has done nothing about it. NIKUV is still in Zimbabwe selling its services to the regime. A few months ago, a senior civil servant in Zimbabwe told the courts of a princely sum being paid to a company linked to NIKUV but would not say what the payment was for. In the 2013 elections NIKUV was paid US$ 10 million for helping the regime corrupt the voters’ roll.
"Mugabe and the senior echelons of Zimbabwe's military share a nationalist liberation ideology wrought during the fight for independence from white rule during the 1960s and 1970s," you said.
Whatever pretentions President Mugabe has to being a statesman with principles and ideology have all long vanished as his greed for power and wealth emerged as the only God he worships! The man is a corrupt and murderous tyrant with no sense of justice or common sense.
President Mugabe, war veterans and many in the security services are fighting each other and it is not over ideology but power!
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